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THE EDGE OF THE ORIENT 



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From the Desert. 



THE 



EDGE OF THE ORIENT 



BY 



ROBERT HOWARD RUSSELL 




NEW YORK 

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 

1896 



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1 1 1 



Copyright, 1896, bv 
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 












TROW OIRECTORY 

PRINTING AND BOOKBINDING COMPANY 

NEW YORK 



1 <. 1 , l l 



TO 
BARBOUR LATHROP 

IN REMEMBRANCE OF OUR PLEASANT 
JOURNEYINGS TOGETHER 



CONTENTS 



/. Zara, 






Page 
I 


//. Sebenico and Scardona, 






30 


III. Trau and Spalato, 






49 


IV. Cur^ola and Ragusa, . 






68 


V. Cattaro and Montenegro, . 






88 


VI. Constantinople, . 






140 


VII. The Sweet Waters of Europe, 






162 


VIII. Smyrna and Salonica, . 






177 


IX. Beyrout and Damascus, 






196 


X. The Pacha's Levee, 






225 


XI. Alexandria and Cairo, 






241 


XII. Luxor and Assouan, . 






269 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 









Page 


From the Desert, 


Frontispiece. 


Miramar. The Chateau of Maximilian, 


. 3 


Trieste. The Water Front, . . . ' . 






7 


Trieste. Grand Canal and San Antonio Nuovo, 






11 


Market Woman, 






13 


Morlaks, 






14 


Street Types, 






16 


Shrine of Saint Simeon, 






17 


Via Larga, Zara, . 






21 


The Municipo, 






23 


The Piazza dell' Erbe, 






25 


A Conscript, 






27 


Sebenico, 






31 


On the Wharf, Sebenico, 






33 


The Public Square, 






35 


Facade of Cathedral, 






36 


Women of the Sebenzani, 






37 


On the Quay at Scardona, 






39 



List of Illustrations 









Page 


Shepherd Boys Playing Svirala, 41 


Falls of Kerka, . 








Castle of Santa Anna, .... 






. 43 










General View of Sebenico, 






. 47 


Old Loggia — Piazza dei Signori, 






. 51 


Market Women in the Piazza, 






. 52 


Morlak Women, ... 






. 53 


Morlaks Outside the Porta di Terra Ferma, 






. 57 


Ruins of Salona, 






. 59 


Spalato. The Harbor, .... 






60 


Spalato. From the North, 






. 61 


Peristyle of Diocletian's Palace, Spalato, 






. 63 


Curzola, 






. 69 


Old Strong Tower, Curzola, 






. 71 










Cloister of the Dominican Monastery, Ragusa, 






. 78 


Ragusa — Old Fountain near the Porta Pille, 






. 79 










Approach to Ragusa, 






. 84 


The Moat and Land Walls, Ragusa, . 






. 86 








. 91 


Santa Maria dello Scarpello, .... 






. 94 








. 95 



Xll 



List of Illustrations 

Page 

The Cathedral, Cattaro, 99 

Cattaro, 103 

Cattaro and the Military Road to Montenegro, .... 107 

In the Black Mountains, 109 

Cettinje, the Capital City, 112 

Prince Nicholas I., of Montenegro, 115 

Girl of Montenegro, 119 

Montenegrin Peasants, 121 

Montenegrins, 126 

A Mountain Lake, 128 

Albanian Boy, 129 

Albanian Peasant Woman, 133 

A Comprehensive View of Cettinje, 137 

The Old Walls, 141 

Ancient Columns in St. Sophia, 143 

Troops of the Sultan's Body-guard, 147 

Waiting for the Sultan, 151 

A Turkish Beggar, 1 54 

Far-away-Moses at Home, 157 

The Galata Bridge, 1 59 

A Bend in the River, 163 

Turkish Woman wearing the Yashmak or Veil, . . .168 

The Sultan's Kiosk, 169 

Gypsy Women Singing, 1 70 

xiii 



List of Illustrations 



The Turkish Arsenal, 

Under the Trees, 

Araba or Turkish Wagon, 

Approaching Smyrna, 

Upper Harbor, Smyrna, . 

Houses in the Turkish Quarter, 

Turkish Graveyard and Mosque, 

Smyrna and the Harbor, from Mount Pagus, 

The Cave of the Seven Sleepers, 

How Brigands are Treated, 

Ruins of the Temple of Diana at Ephesus, 

A Warning to Malefactors, 

Salonica. The Genoese Tower, 

The Inn at Shtora, .... 

The Great Columns. Baalbek, 

Illustrating the Diameter of a Fallen Column, 

The Great Stones in the Walls. Baalbek, . 

Tomb of Saladin in Damascus, . 

Tombs Decorated during Feast of Beiram, 

The House of Shamiyeh in the Christian Quarter, 

The Burned Omayyade Mosque, 

View of Damascus from the Garbiyeh Minaret of the 

Mosque, 

Camel Litter, with the Embroidered Cloths for Mecca, 



Great 



Page 

171 
172 
174 
178 
180 
181 
182 
183 
185 
186 
187 
189 
193 
197 
202 
203 
205 
209 
211 
213 
215 

216 
217 



xiv 



List of Illustrations 









Page 


Waiting for the Procession, 220 


The Pilgrimage Starting for Mecca, . 






. 221 


The Women on the Housetops, 






. 223 


The Interview with the Pacha, . 






. 231 


The Pacha's Levee, 






. 237 


A Cairo Street, 






. 251 


In the Muski, 






• 255 


The Sphinx as a Background, .... 






. 257 


Rameses the Great, an Egyptian Donkey, . 






. 262 


Shadoof Workers on the Banks of the Nile, 






. 263 


Two Little Fellaheen Girls, 






. 265 


A Nile Landing, 






. 267 


Mahmoud, 






. 271 


Snake Charmers and Jugglers, 






. 275 


Soudanese Actors, 






. 277 


Valley of the Tombs of the Kings, . 






. 281 


Ready to Shoot the Cataract, . 






. 285 



XV 



THE EDGE OF THE ORIENT 

i 

ZARA 

IF you wish to get out of the beaten round of 
European travel ; if you wish to see one of the 
most beautiful and interesting parts of the world 
where picturesque costumes are yet worn, and 
the people are still simple and unsophisticated; 
if you wish to find a climate that surpasses the 
Riviera, then run down to Trieste and take an 
Austrian Lloyd boat down the coast of Istria to 
Dalmatia, and if you can manage it, try to see 
Montenegro." 

This advice was given me by an Austrian gov- 
ernment official as we sat one day under the 
shade of the blossoming chestnut -trees in the 
Haupt Allee watching the endless parade of 
Viennese wealth and beauty taking its afternoon 
airing in the Prater, and, although Vienna is suffi- 
ciently attractive in the spring to make one wish 
to tarry there indefinitely, the novelty of the ex- 
cursion appealed to me, and one morning early in 



The Edge of the Orient 



May found me on the Slid Bahn Railway, on an 
early morning train bound for Trieste. 

For some time after leaving Vienna the route 
traverses a beautiful plain rising gradually into 
the hills, where the famous Voslau wine is pro- 
duced. At Gloggnitz you reach the commence- 
ment of the famous Semmering Railway, the 
pioneer of mountain railroads, and begin the as- 
cent of the Styrian Alps, going through fifteen 
tunnels and over eighteen viaducts in the first 
thirty-five miles, while beautiful vistas of gray 
cliffs and green valleys are continually opening to 
you as you shoot out into the sunshine from the 
dark caverns which pierce the heart of the moun- 
tains. 

At Klamm a gray cliff rises sheer from the 
centre of the valley, and from its summit rises 
the battered old castle of Prince Liechtenstein, 
once the very key of all Styria, but now deserted, 
half destroyed and looking pitifully powerless to 
cope with the engines of modern warfare. Then 
you pass over a great viaduct, and after plunging 
through a few more tunnels find yourself on the 
other side of Semmering, descending into a 
grassy valley for a long run through the whole 
length of Styria, with flying glimpses of Gratz, 
with its fine old Schlossberg towering three hun- 
dred and fifty feet above the town ; and pictur- 
esque old Marburg on the banks of the Dray, the 



Zara 



centre of the Styrian fruit and wine country. 
Then the Julian Alps rise like misty clouds upon 
the horizon, and the snow-capped crown of Ter- 
glou peers over the heads of the others in the 
dim distance. Crossing the dreary rock-strewn 
plain of Karst to Divaca; where the celebrated 
grottos, caverns, and cataracts of St. Canzian and 
the Kronprinz Rudolf are, in another hour you 
are skirting a slope of trellised vines, olives, and 
figs, while before you stretches the beautiful blue 
Adriatic, Trieste, and the Istrian coast ; and just 
below, on the Punta di Grignano, projecting into 
the sea, is Miramar, the unfortunate Maximilian's 
beautiful castle, from whose marble towers once 
floated the flag of Mexico. 

Trieste is a very modern, new, and smart-look- 
ing city, and is one of the busiest-looking places 
you come across on the continent. Boats from 
every clime and every nation line the stone quays 
and cluster round the molos, and great freight 
trains crawl along the river-front distributing and 
collecting cargo from the ships. The blue waters 
are dotted with variegated sails from Venice and 
Chioggia, and the streets are peopled with sailors 
from all lands. The Corso is thronged with busy 
shoppers, and toward evening all Trieste turns 
out and takes possession of the innumerable small 
tables in front of the restaurants in the Piazza 
Grande, where groups of dignified-looking Aus- 



The Edge of the Orient 



trian officers in full uniform are seated in the 
open street discussing ridiculous little yellow, 
red, and green ices like a lot of schoolboys. How- 
ever, the ices are not so distressing as are the 
cigars which are smoked here ; a good whiff from 
one of those blown in your face by a passing sol- 
dier being a revelation in the possibilities of bad 
tobacco. The Austrians, who are an ingenious 
people, have invented a way of smoking them 
which probably tempers their severity. The end 
of the cigar is thrust into a little pasteboard cor- 
nucopia having at the lesser end a long quill. 
This removes the cigar from the immediate vic- 
inity of the smoker, and gives it an additional 
flavor of pasteboard and goose-quill which may 
possibly render it more desirable. 

At the long Molo San Carlo a trim little 
steamer, the Trieste, which had just returned 
from a three months' cruise, for which it had been 
chartered by Stephanie, the crown princess of 
Austria, was lying, puffing out little jets of steam 
as though impatient to be off and reveal to its 
passengers the old walled cities of the Dalmatian 
coast, and the beautiful islands of the Adriatic ; so 
one May morning we cast loose from the wharf 
and steamed away south, keeping close to the 
olive-clad shores of Istria, and passing the pretty 
coast towns of Pirano, battlemented bv the tow- 
ers and pinnacles of an ancient fortress ; Umago, 



Zara 



with its lofty spire ; and Parenzo, once the first 
station of the Crusaders. At Rovigno a slender 
miniature Campanile, copied from its great proto- 
type at Venice, lifts its head high above the lit- 
tle town and remains in sight a long time as we 
steam slowly along. Then we pass the little 
island of Brione, and shortly after, on rounding 
a promontory crowned by a metal bombproof 
turret, come suddenly into view of the harbor of 
Pola. 

All day we have been passing picturesque lit- 
tle craft from Venice and Chioggia, with quaint 
shaped sails of many colors, which were apparent- 
ly sailing lazily about for no other purpose than 
to attract painters of water-colors, and decorate 
and beautify the bosom of the blue Adriatic ; but 
here at Pola we see the modern iron-clad fleet of 
the Austro-Hungarian navy, not so picturesque 
perhaps, but grim and formidable, and behind 
these modern war engines the gray walls of the 
old arena constructed in the time of the Anto- 
nines as a theatre for the combats of gladiators 
and wild beasts. The arched enclosure, in which 
over fifteen thousand people could have witnessed 
the desperate struggles of the trained gladiators, 
or the fierce encounters of wild beasts, is now 
peacefully carpeted with green turf and over- 
grown with ivy and wild geranium. Toward the 
other side of the town on Monte Zara, an emi- 

9 



The Edge of the Orient 



nence commanding a beautiful view of the harbor, 
stands Kundmann's noble statue of the Austrian 
naval hero, Tegetthoff, gazing fixedly out at sea, 
far bevond the steel-clad fleet which lies at an- 
chor below ; while close at hand is the Austrian 
naval school where boys in blue uniforms learn to 
furl sails and climb the tall mast which is set in 
the ground with a great net spread below to 
catch them in case of a fall. 

At the head of the Bay of Quarnero, which lies 
to the east of the Istrian peninsula, is Fiume, the 
chief seaport of Hungary, and near by is the lit- 
tle Croatian town of Delnicze which has recently 
attained to fame in consequence of a wholesale 
elopement which was carried on there lately by 
twenty-six gallant young Croatian Lochinvars 
who descended upon the town and carried off on 
horseback the twenty-six maidens of their choice, 
in spite of the ineffectual protests of their bewil- 
dered parents. It is not uncommon for Croatian 
girls to force consent to their marriages by elope- 
ment, but an organized raid on this scale was un- 
precedented, and made a sensation even in Croa- 
tia. 

One hundred miles to the south of Pola lies 
Zara, the capital of Dalmatia, the southernmost 
crown land of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, a 
long, attenuated strip of territory stretching from 
Istria to Montenegro. Narrow as are the limits 




o 



Zara 



of Dalmatia, confined between the blue waters of 
the Adriatic and the bleak, barren limestone 
mountain, it has produced a fine race of brave 




Market Woman. 



and bold seamen and soldiers who were once the 
pride and main support of the great republic of 
Venice. They are to-day, however, as they have 
always been, a people of little education, and even 



13 



The Edge of the Orient 



the Turk, who has many times been made to re- 
spect their prowess, has a sneering proverb which 
says, " Without a book, like a Dalmatian." 

Zara is the 
place whose 
existence you 
have always 
doubted when 
you have seen 
it on the label 
of a maraschino 
bottle, for the 
reason that no 
one could ever 
tell you where 
it was, and the 
only allusion 
you ever saw 
to it in print 
was that on the 
label, so when 
you come sail- 
ing into the 
beautiful har- 
bor and your steamer makes fast to the fine 
stone quay which extends along the whole length 
of the town, having replaced the great walls which 
struck terror to the hearts of the Crusaders who 
once came here and besieged the old city, it ra- 

14 




Morlaks. 



Zara 



ther surprises you to find that it is a real place 
and not an invention of the lithographer who 
printed the maraschino labels. 

Zara is not only real, but it is exceedingly pict- 
uresque. The early market in the public square 
is full of color and costume, fine, buxom-looking 
girls, with brown skins and dark eyes, are selling 
artichokes, flowers, vegetables and poultry, or 
standing at ease with the carcass of a dead lamb 
held carelessly before them by the hind legs, as 
a New York debutante might hold a bouquet. 
Picturesque groups of morlaks, or gypsies, from 
the country stroll about the market-place, the 
men wearing short jackets of coarse blue home- 
spun stuff, embroidered with designs in red and 
yellow, and trousers of the same material, open 
at the sides below the knee and supported by 
great leathern belts ornamented with brass, and 
often roughly set with agates and other colored 
stones; their feet shod in roughly made mocca- 
sins worn over gay - colored coarse stockings ; 
and, placed at a jaunty angle on their heads, little 
red skull-caps edged with black. The women are 
still more gorgeously arrayed in a costume not 
unlike that of our traditional stage Indian prin- 
cess. Austrian soldiers in plain dull blue uni- 
forms chat with the flower-girls; venders of 
paper flowers and tapers bargain in the doorway 
of the Duomo with their customers ; and the 



The Edge of the Orient 



whole square presents a scene of bustling activ- 
ity which is heightened by the shrill cries of the 




Street Types. 



market-women in their endeavors to call atten- 
tion to their wares. 

There is a quaint old church at Zara containing 



16 



Zara 



a silver-gilt shrine in which it is claimed reposes 
the body of Saint Simeon, the prophet who held 
the infant Jesus in his arms and sang the Nunc 
Dimittis. The shrine, which is in the shape of an 
ark over six feet in length and five feet in height, 
is covered with most highly decorated and 
wrought silver panels, and is supported by two 
marble and two bronze angels, the latter having 
been cast from guns captured in the seventh cen- 
tury from the Turks by the Venetians. Accord- 
ing to tradition, the body of the good saint was 
brought to Zara by a knight returning from the 
Crusades, Avhose ship, after encountering a severe 
gale at sea, drifted helplessly into the port of Zara. 
While awaiting repairs to his vessel the knight 
fell ill, and on his death-bed divulged to the monks 
in attendance that he had on board his ship no less 
precious a relic than the body of Saint Simeon. 
After the death of the knight the body of the 
saint was exhibited in the church, and many mar- 
vellous cures were wrought by it, causing its 
fame to spread throughout all Dalmatia. In the 
fourteenth century, Queen Elizabeth, of Hungary, 
made a visit to Zara, and wishing to take away 
with her some relic of the venerable miracle- 
worker, she broke a finger from one of his hands, 
in return for which the enraged saint deprived 
her of her sight on the spot. She strove to flee 
from the church but was unable to find the door, 

J 9 



The Edge of the Orient 



so groping her way back to the altar she fell on 
her knees, confessed her sin, and replaced the 
finger which immediately united itself to the 
hand. The Queen's sight was restored, but her 
own hand which had touched the body of the 
saint became withered. Then, for the second time, 
the Queen made supplication to the saint for for- 
giveness, promising to present him with a silver 
shrine in which his body could be more becom- 
ingly bestowed than in the humble wooden affair 
in which he then rested. This promise appeased 
the venerable prophet, the Queen's withered hand 
was at once made whole, and upon her return to 
her palace she commissioned a Milanese silver- 
smith named Francesco to execute this costly 
shrine, in the construction of which nearly one 
thousand pounds of silver were used, and, as Fran- 
cesco received twenty-eight thousand ducats for 
his labor, the Queen had a pretty penny to pay for 
a broken finger. The body of the saint is still in 
an excellent state of preservation ; the head rests 
on a wooden pillow which supports a silver crown 
set with precious stones, while on the forefinger 
are numerous beautifully chased gold rings said 
to have been placed there by the courtiers of 
Queen Elizabeth at the time the finger was so 
miraculously joined to the hand. 

There are other interesting old churches in 
Zara dating back to the thirteenth century, and 



Zara 



having richly carved altars and choir-stalls ; and 
then there are some very modern-looking build- 




The Municipo. 



ings on the principal street, the Via Larga, and a 
new tower, built after designs by Jackson, the 
English archaeologist, who is an authority on 



23 



The Edge of the Orient 



Dalmatia and has written three volumes on the 
subject. The Dalmatians of to-day first discov- 
ered their past history through him, and as a re- 
ward for his services to their country they have 
caused a gold medal to be struck in his honor. 

Hidden away here and there amongst the 
modern buildings are the relics of the Roman 
and Venetian occupations of the old town. Frag- 
ments of an old Roman temple, dedicated to 
Juno Augusta, consort of Emperor Augustus, 
have been built into the ancient church of St. 
Donato, which was erected in the ninth century. 
In the Piazza dell' Erbe rises an antique Corin- 
thian column crowned with the lion of St. Mark, 
having heavy iron rings fixed in its base, showing 
that it was once used as a pillory. Farther on are 
the Cinque Pozzi (five fountains), erected in 1574 
by the Veronese architect Sammicheli, who also 
constructed the land gate of the town. In the 
Piazza del Signori is the Municipo, now used as 
a fire department and conscripting office, whence 
now and then emerges a tall Dalmatian, holding 
his head high in the air and stepping proudly, 
impressed with his newly won importance as a 
soldier of the Emperor Franz Joseph. 

A delightful walk along the Riva Nuova brings 
you to a part of the town where the gateways are 
bowered with roses and the cherry-trees are in 

full bloom. Here lives Guiseppe Manzin, the vil- 

24 




1 /' * '•- 



The Piazza dell' Erbe. 



i 



Zara 



lage doctor, and the moving spirit of the town, 
The old gentleman ushered us into his parlor, a 
long narrow room down the centre of which ran 
a row of marble pedestals supporting a curious 




A Conscript. 



array of modern Italian art, chief among which 
were busts of Guiseppe and his wife, ready, as he 
told us, to be placed upon their tombstones at 
their death. With great pride did the old doctor 
and his wife show us the treasures of their parlor — 
the wonder of Dalmatia. The old 



gentleman 



27 



The Edge of the Orient 



seated himself at a new mechanical piano from 
Paris, and let his hands roam lightly over the 
keys, while he pumped away vigorously on the 
treadle with his feet, and, when he had finished, 
the old lady brought out a mechanical bird in a 
golden cage and put her head down to the lit- 
tle feathered automaton and called " cheepie — 
cheepie — cheepie " encouragingly, as she put in 
motion the mechanism which gave him voice. 
The old people knew every note and movement 
of the bird, and as he turned his head from side 
to side they bent over and encouraged him with 
chirps and calls and terms of endearment, evincing 
the greatest possible pride in his performance. 
Last of all they showed us their dining-room, 
where a great sideboard was set as if for a ban- 
quet, with wax fruit, papier-mache turkeys, hams 
and joints ; baskets of grapes, peaches and pears 
carved from marble and brilliantly colored, and a 
large centre-piece of artificial flowers. This was 
their piece de resistance, and the old people fairly 
beamed with pride as they showed us the various 
pieces. When we took our leave the old gentle- 
man courteously bowed us out of his house, and 
we strolled back to the stone quay where our 
steamer was lying, stopping on the way to buy a 
bottle of the famous " Rosolio Maraschino," dis- 
tilled from "Amarasca," the cherries which grow 

in profusion on the lime-stone soil of Poljica, for 

28 



Zara 



which we paid only twenty cents — less than is 
sometimes charged for a tiny liqueur-glass of it 
here. 

Then we boarded our little steamer and sailed 
away through a narrow winding strait between 
rocky walls, bearing with us a pleasant memory 
of the quaint old town of Zara, and of the con- 
tent and childlike old couple living their peace- 
ful lives there surrounded by their toys. 



II 

SEBENICO AND SCARDONA 

SOME fifty miles to the south of Zara, lies the 
picturesque old city of Sebenico. As you 
approach the harbor from the Adriatic you can- 
not fail to be impressed with the admirable judg- 
ment displayed by the ancient robbers and pirates 
who founded the city in choosing the situation 
for their stronghold. 

Between you and the broad sheet of still blue 
water which reflects the quaint old houses, tow- 
ers, and castles of the ancient city is stretched 
an apparently impenetrable barrier. Presently, 
however, the steamer reaches a narrow cleft in 
the rock close under an old Venetian fortress, 
above which the lion of St. Mark still keeps 
watch, proudly ignoring the fact that the town 
has long since ceased to be his to guard. 

The opening in the rocks is barely wide enough 
to admit of the passage of the steamer, which 
slowly and cautiously makes its way through the 
tortuous channel to the beautiful harbor, on the 
farther side of which, piled up against the side of 



Sebenico and Scardona 



the mountain, are the picturesque old houses and 
gray walls of the city, overshadowed and com- 
manded by the massive battlements of the old 
castle of Santa Anna, built on the highest point of 




On the Wharf, Sebenico. 



the town ; while far above, on the mountain side, 
where the old robbers were used to watch the sea 
for ships which they might plunder, are the two 
castles of San Giorgio and II Barone. 

Our steamer made fast to the stone quay, 
where a group of sullen-looking men in pictur- 



33 



The Edge of the Orient 



esque costumes stood regarding us with mild 
curiosity. Their little red caps, which are not 
bigger than the palm of your hand, have a dab 
of black fringe over the right ear, and are worn 
jauntily upon the side of their heads, where they 
are held in place by elastic bands; their red or 
blue waistcoats are decorated with silver orna- 
ments and coins, and display two rows of large 
filigree buttons hanging pendant from little sil- 
ver chains. Rough, shaggy jackets or cloaks 
covered with bunches of woollen fringe, and 
trousers of a coarse blue or brown homespun 
material roughly made, but gaily worked at the 
pockets, drawn tight to the leg, and often fas- 
tened up the back of the calf with a row of small 
silver buttons or hooks ; and on their feet the 
opanka — a kind of moccasin or sandal made of a 
piece of rawhide turned up and fastened together 
at the toe, and laced over the instep with leathern 
thongs. Above this is worn a kind of spat of gay 
embroidery reaching above the ankle which com- 
pletes the adornment of a Dalmatian gallant. 
Not long ago the morlak, or countryman of this 
part of the world, used to tie up his hair behind 
in a tight little pigtail, and wear his shirt outside 
of his trousers ; but few of the Dalmatians of to- 
day adhere to this old custom. 

Sebenico is filled with picturesque bits of ar- 
chitecture, carved doorways, sculptured coats of 

34 



Sebenico and Scardona 



arms on the gray walls, and quaint mullioned 
windows, looking out on the steep narrow streets, 
while the oft-recurring lion of St. Mark is a 
constant reminder of the days of Venetian su- 
premacy. At one end of the town is the public 
square, with rude wooden benches beneath the 




The Public Square. 



trees, where the old people sit in the sun and 
gossip, and the young people sit in the moonlight 
and make love ; and toward the other end is the 
old cathedral, with its great round dome, rising 
from the stone roof one hundred feet above the 
transept, and its richly carved marbles in the 
chancel and baptisterium. Opposite the cathe- 
dral, and separated from it by an open square, 
is the old Loggia, formerly the town-hall, but 



35 



The Edge of the Orient 



now doing duty as a third-class cafe. This open 
square is the favorite promenade of the women 



r% 




\ 




Facade of Cathedral. 



of Sebenico, and on feast-days they deck them- 
selves in all their finery and walk up and down 
in little groups of two or three all the afternoon, 
for the delectation of the Sebenzani gallants, who 
sit on the stone seats by the side of the cathe- 

36 



Sebenico and Scardona 



dral, or at the little tables of the cafe opposite, 
and placidly smoke and watch the show. 




Women of the Sebenzani. 



The women of Sebenico have a costume pecul- 
iar to themselves, consisting of a short blue or 
black pleated skirt, with a dark bodice worn over 
a white chemise with flowing sleeves. The front 
of the bodice is laced with a heavy silk cord of 



37 



The Edge of the Orient 



any bright color which may suit the fancy of the 
wearer ; young girls and unmarried women have 
a white linen front beautifully starched and clean 
to cover the bosom, while the married women 
wear a crimson or figured velvet instead of the 
linen, and when they have a great many chil- 
dren they proclaim their pride in their maternal 
achievements to an appreciative public by ex- 
changing their crimson for black. Their hair 
is worn twisted up in a knot at the back of the 
head, with a wisp of white cloth braided into it, 
and covered with a white panno fastened like a 
turban, with long pendant ends behind. The 
effect of the costume is greatly destroyed by the 
almost universal adoption in cool weather of a 
sort of knit cardigan jacket, which conceals the 
picturesque white flowing sleeves. 

From Sebenico to the Kerka Falls is about 
twelve miles, and makes a picturesque trip by 
boat, winding along up the river through bluffs 
and bare rocks of a yellow or orange color, which 
widen out as the river expands into the broad 
stretch known as Lake Prokljan, above which is 
Scardona, with its white church towers and the 
ruins of an old castle on a high crag lifting 
themselves above the olive-trees which embower 
the little town. There is not much left of Scar- 
dona. Since the seventh century Latins, Slavs, 
Croatians, Venetians, Hungarians, and Turks have 

38 



Sebenico and Scardona 



successfully fought for it, gained it, and held 
brief sway over it ; and, as if these devastating 
wars and demoralizing changes of ownership 




On the Quay at Scardona. 

were not enough to discourage the little town, it 
has several times been sacked and burned by the 
neighboring cities of the coast, on account of the 
piratical habits of its citizens ; and now fever, 
which rises from a stagnant marsh at the back of 

39 



The Edge of the Orient 



the town, has set its mark upon them, and is do- 
ing its best to dispose of the few remaining in- 
habitants. If the traveller finds but little to see 
in Scardona to-day he can at least comfort himself 
by reflecting that he has afforded a pleasurable 
excitement in the lives of its citizens by visiting 
them, as visits from the outside world are ap- 
parently of rare occurrence, and are regarded 
as an occasion for a general holiday and merry- 
making. When we first caught sight of Scardo- 
na it had the appearance of a deserted village, not 
a soul being in sight ; as we approached, a few of 
the more alert citizens appeared running toward 
the wharf. When we had landed we were fol- 
lowed through the streets by at least half the 
population of the hamlet, and even the Italians, 
who were playing mora in the dark basements 
of the little wine-shops came out from their dens 
and joined our escort, and by the time we were 
ready to depart on our way to the falls, every 
man, woman, and child in the place was on the 
wharf to see us off. 

From Scardona you ascend the river through 
another rocky gorge, on the right of which rises 
Mount Tartaro, where the grapes for the Tartaro 
wine, which is highly esteemed in Dalmatia, are 
grown. Here and there along the barren, desert- 
like banks of the river are miserable little hovels 
which serve as shelter for the shepherds who 



4 o 



Sebenico and Scardona 



tend the flocks of lean sheep and goats, which the 
Dalmatians say feed on stones, and there is cer- 
tainly nothing in the appearance of the wretched 




animals which would appear to contradict the 
statement. 

A sudden turn in the stream reveals the end of 
the gorge, where the sparkling waters of the falls 
of Kerka find an outlet from their narrow chan- 
nel, and go rushing and foaming over the rocks, 
forcing their way between the little wooded isl- 
ands and clumps of luxuriant foliage that stretch 
across the pass between the two ranges of sterile 



41 



The Edge of the Orient 



mountains. Here and there nestles a rude little 
cabin, whose occupants appear at our approach, 
and regard us with silent curiosity. The boys 
who tend the sheep and goats on the hills near 
by leave their flocks to their own devices, and 
come down to reap a harvest of small change 
by piping to us on their rudely carved wooden 
whistles, or svirala, as they name them, or offer 
us pieces of stalactite formation which they find 
in the small caverns about the falls. 

The total height of the falls is about one hun- 




Falls of Kerka. 



dred and sixty feet, although nowhere do they 
have a sheer fall of any great height or descend 



42 




Castle of Santa Anna. 



Sebenico and Scardona 



in full volume, but spread the entire width of the 
valley, springing from the hills above in a series 
of leaps over rocky steps of from ten to thirty 
feet in height, twisting and turning as they come 
down, so that at no one point can you see the en- 
tire descent. 

Higher up, beyond the point where the ranges 
of barren hills almost close together, is the lake 
of Vissovay, where, on a little wooded island, a 
few Franciscan monks spend peaceful lives in 
their little convent in the midst of the waters. 
Above the lake you can trace the river as it 
comes rushing down between the hills on its way 
from Mount Dinara, about twenty miles beyond, 
where it issues with a bound from a dark cavern 
in the mountain-side. The water-power from the 
falls has within a few years been applied to a 
pumping-station which affords Sebenico a plenti- 
ful supply of wholesome river-water, and now the 
enterprising inhabitants of that city, under the 
guidance of the Austrian Government, which has 
done so much for the improvement and develop- 
ment of its Dalmatian province, are building a 
power-house here which will generate electricity 
to be carried over the hills by wires to light the 
narrow streets of the old town. 

Toward evening we returned to Sebenico, and 
found the streets thronged with promenaders in 
their gayest costume, as it was Whit-Monday. 

45 



The Edge of the Orient 



Beside the gray walls of the old Duomo, on a low 
stone bench, were seated a little group of Seben- 
zani. Two young girls with the gayest of silken 
lacings and freshest of white linen were at one 
end of the group, and next the prettiest one was 
sitting a handsome, lithe-looking gallant, with his 







'^ > T:' 



A Jealous Maiden. 

red cap, bronzed face, and gorgeous waistcoat 
with silver buttons, while beyond was a wrinkled 
and dark-skinned old lady. The young people 
were not talking together, nor did the man even 
look at the dark-haired girl by whose side he sat, 
for the proud Dalmatian considers it beneath his 
dignity to talk to women in a public place, but 

the girl seemed happy and contented that he 

4 6 



Sebenico and Scardona 



should honor her by sitting beside her. Presently 
a group of women strolled along the piazza, two 
of them evidently sisters from their strong resem- 
blance to each other. The elder wore the black 
front over her bosom which proclaimed her the 
mother of many children, while the younger and 





General View of Sebenico. 

prettier of the two wore the white linen which 
announced her single state. As they approached, 
the young gallant on the bench started to his feet. 
The young girl modestly cast her eyes upon the 
ground as if she had not seen him, and the group 
turned and walked back toward the other end of 
the city, followed by the young man and the jeal- 
ous and reproachful glances of the two maidens 
whom he had deserted. 

At dinner our regret at leaving Sebenico was 
somewhat diminished by the music of the muni- 
cipal band, which consisted for the most part of 

47 



The Edge of the Orient 



boys of twelve or fourteen dressed in blue uni- 
forms, wearing little derby hats ornamented with 
waving plumes of cocks' feathers at the side. The 
mistaken kindness of the authorities subjected us 
to the crudities of their performance all during 
dinner, and it was not until we had put some 
miles of blue water between our steamer and the 
harbor of Sebenico that the memories of their 
discords were entirely obliterated. 



4 8 



Ill 

TRAU AND SPALATO 

EARLY one morning our little vessel cast loose 
from the stone quay at Sebenico, and thread- 
ing its way out of the narrow channel steamed 
away south between the mainland and the island 
of Zlarin, toward little Traii, the ancient Tragiiri- 
um of the Romans. A few miles below Sebenico 
we passed out into the open sea and rounded the 
rocky promontory of Diomedis, famous through 
two thousand years for its dangers, but looking 
peaceful and quiet enough on this calm morning, 
crowned by its little votive chapel built by a 
grateful mariner, who so narrowly escaped ship- 
wreck on this notorious point that he at once 
commenced the erection of the chapel to com- 
memorate his escape, using his whole cargo of 
Malvasia wine to mix the mortar used in the con- 
struction of his thank-offering. 

After rounding this redoubtable headland we 
again pass under the lee of a group of islands and 
presently come into view of the massive stone 

49 



The Edge of the Orient 



towers of the old fortification, and the graceful 
church-spires of the ancient Roman city. 

Trail is built on a small island cut off from 
the mainland by a narrow channel crossed by a 
wooden bridge, while opposite, protecting the 
little city from the boras — the fierce storms of the 
Adriatic — lies the island of Bua. The two islands 
are connected by a stone drawbridge, and are 
so close together that our steamer throws a rope 
to each, which being made fast we lie in mid- 
stream a little distance above the drawbridge. 

Our arrival had been expected at Traii, and we 
were met on the wharf by II Conte Gian Do- 
menico de Fanfogna, the Podesta of the city, who 
conducted us through the lion-guarded gateway 
in the walls near a picturesque old Loggia, to the 
Piazza dei Signori, at one side of which is the im- 
posing old cathedral, with fine sculpture and 
wonderful carvings beneath its impressive dark 
porch, while opposite is the old Loggia, which in 
Venetian times was the open-air court of justice, 
and where in honor of our arrival the munici- 
pal band was stationed, playing away industri- 
ously for our benefit. The Piazza was thronged 
with citizens listening to the music. Conspicuous 
in the crowd were the morlak women with their 
towering head-dresses, consisting of a kind of 
crown of red cloth built high up on their heads, 

and covered with a smooth, white linen kerchief 

50 



Trali and Spalato 



falling in folds to their shoulders. This, with the 
heavy woollen aprons woven in gay stripes, 
and long, dark blue, sleeveless coats worn over a 
white woollen undergarment with flowing sleeves, 
all elaborately embroidered and decorated, makes 
one of the most striking and most picturesque 




Old Loggia — Piazza dei Signori. 

costumes that can be seen in all Europe to-day. 
Some of the old market women, with their wicker 
baskets filled with green vegetables, and with 
faces seared by hardship and exposure, were 
such veritable old crones that they could have 
appeared as the witches in Macbeth without the 
trouble of making up. A good-natured Dalma- 

51 



The Edge of the Orient 



tian held two of the morlak women, whose mod- 
esty prompted them to escape my camera, and 




Market Women in the Piazza. 



while they were laughing at their capture I got a 
picture of the group. Finding that I had taken 
their pictures while they were laughing they 



52 






Trali and Spalato 



were much disturbed, fearing- perhaps that I 
could not have done them justice under such 
circumstances, and came and stood before me in 
solemn seriousness, with their hands folded, in 
order that I might obtain a more dignified sou- 
venir of our meeting. 

A reverend father conducted us through the 
doorway of the cathedral, which was guarded on 
one side by a great stone lion, above which was 
the figure of Adam, while on the other side, sup- 
ported by a great lioness, stood Eve. The dimly 
lit interior is sombre and majestic, and rich with 
curious old carvings, and the treasury contains 
some fine old silver and wonderful embroidered 
vestments. When we had seen all the glories of 
the old Duomo, and the fine old organ, under the 
direction of our guide, had pealed a welcome to 
us, we were taken out beyond the walls of the 
city through the Porta di Terra Firma, which 
bears the statue of the redoubtable San Giovanni 
Orsini, the patron saint of Traii, whose bones 
repose in a chapel bearing his name in the old 
cathedral. San Giovanni was a wonderful man in 
his life-time, and well deserves the grateful re- 
membrance of the Tratirini. Among his benevo- 
lent acts are cited the causing of scanty vintages 
to produce unusual quantities of wine, walking 
out on the waves to the rescue of a shipwrecked 
crew off Diomedis, and the destruction of Colo- 

55 



The Edge of the Orient 



man's battering ram with a sling. When the 
Venetians sacked Traii in 1171 they found the 
body of the saint in the ark, which they were 
searching for treasure. Upon his finger was a 
wonderful ring, which through the intervention 
of some miraculous power could not be removed. 
Determined not to be baffled by a miracle the 
Venetian despoilers ruthlessly tore the arm from 
the body and carried it back to Venice with them, 
depositing it in the church of San Giovanni di 
Rialto. Some three years after, according to 
the Traiirini, San Giovanni, " who would be all 
their own," caused his arm to return on the eve of 
his festival, when it " came flying like a com- 
et through the air, and was found on the ark 
wrapped in white linen," thus showing that the 
efficiency of the old saint as a miracle-worker had 
not been seriously impaired by his death. As a 
further example of his power, which continues 
to the present day, he has caused a cypress-bush 
to spring from between two stones, over the stone 
gateway which bears his effigy, and cunningly con- 
ceal the lion of St. Mark, which was placed there 
to assert the sovereignty of Venice, thus prevent- 
ing the Traiirini of to-day from being reminded 
of their ancient bondage to the Great Republic. 
The Traiirini believes that this bush is miracu- 
lously sustained by the saint himself, and the mor- 

laks regard its appearance each year as a prophesy 

56 



Trail and Spalato 



of a good or bad season according as its foliage 
is green and luxuriant or yellow and sparse. 
Outside the gate a little procession, consisting 




Morlaks outside the Porta di Terra Ferma. 



of all the available rolling-stock of the entire sec- 
tion awaited us, as the streets of Trail are too 
narrow to admit of carriages, and they are but 
little used in the adjoining mountainous country. 



The Edge of the Orient 



Under the guidance of the Podesta we entered 
the six antiquated one-horse chaises, and to the 
wonder of the Traurini, who have seldom seen so 
gallant a cavalcade, we were whirled away across 
the little wooden bridge to the mainland, where 
we were driven to the top of a great hill Avhich 
commands a beautiful view of the little town and 
harbor, and, beyond the slope of the opposite 
island of Bua, the long stretch of the blue Adri- 
atic. Then Ave were driven back through the 
vineyards and orchards of figs to the gateway of 
the little town, with its quaint, narrow streets 
and curious old houses, that has known such a 
changeful history. Founded by the Greeks, 
ruled by the Romans, sacked by the Saracens, at- 
tacked by the Tartars, subjugated by the Ban of 
Bosnia, it has survived and forgotten all its troub- 
lous times, and is passing its old age in peaceful- 
ness and content. 

While the hawsers were being cast loose from 
either shore preparatory to our departure, the 
musicians stationed themselves on the little draw- 
bridge which swung open for us to pass on our 
way to Spalato, and as we glided slowly through 
the narrow opening to the farewell strains of the 
band, the portly figure of the red-bearded Po- 
desta, II Conte Gian Domenico de Fanfogna, ap- 
peared under a sun umbrella in the midst of his 
musicians, waving us adieux. 

58 



Trali and Spalato 




Ruins of Saiona. 



From Traii we proceed down the Canale Cas- 
telli, which takes its name from the Sette Castelli, 
seven villages which originally sprang up under 
the shadows of seven old Venetian fortresses 
which still stand guard over them, and a little 
farther on our steamer makes the circuit of the 
fine bay on the shores of which once stood the 
proud city of Saiona, the old Roman capital of 
Dalmatia and the bulwark of Roman power in 
the province. There is but little remaining above 
ground to testify to the ancient glory of the city. 



59 



The Edge of the Orient 




Spalato. The Harbor. 



Taken and retaken time and again by Goths and 
Huns, it met its final ruin at the hands of the 
Avars in 639, and its marble columns and sculp- 
tured capitals now lie hidden in the dust of the 
centuries that have rolled over them since its 
fall. Rounding another point, we come in view 
of the harbor of Spalato, and in the distance is 
the city crowned by the great campanile which, 
hoarded in scaffolding to its very top, towers 
above the Avails of Diocletian's palace. On May 
1, 305 Diocletian, Emperor of Rome, abdicated 



60 



Trali and Spalato 



his imperial throne and repaired to this his 
Dalmatian palace, ostensibly to raise cabbages, 
thus setting the stamp of imperial approval upon 
the first of May as the proper day on which to 
change one's abode. 

The palace, which was twelve years in build- 
ing, preserves to this day many traces of its for- 
mer magnificence and its solid construction and 
vast proportions still excite admiration — nearly 




Spalato. From the North. 
61 



The Edge of the Orient 



ten acres being enclosed within the massive 
walls, which rise to a height of fifty feet on the 
land side, and over seventy feet toward the sea, 
where the land falls away. Along the quay in 
front of the sea-wall of the palace, market-boats 
from Greece, Turkey, Italy, and Hungary are 
ranged, with their colored sails stretched like 
awnings above their various cargoes of yellow 
fruit, green vegetables, golden dates, figs and 
nuts, and gay pottery of curious shapes, and here 
the boatmen bargain all day long, buying and 
selling or exchanging their wares for merchan- 
dise which will find a ready sale at their own 
ports. Here we see the first turbans of Mo- 
hammedans, as Spalato is the principal port for 
goods which are sent from Italy to Turkey over- 
land, and the Turkish merchants have agents here 
to buy and ship their goods to them. The work- 
manship of the jewellers here shows traces of 
oriental influence, and some of the silver fili- 
gree work is as fine and well executed as any to 
be found in the bazaars of Constantinople or 
Damascus. 

Diocletian's palace, although sufficiently large 
for the abode of one man, has made a cramped 
little city of Spalato, three-fourths of which is 
built within the palace walls. When the citizens 
of Salona were driven from their city by the 
Avars they fled here for protection and estab- 



62 




Peristyle of Diocletian's Palace, Spalato. 



Traii and Spalato 



lished themselves within the walls of the palace, 
building up every available space within their 
bounds, and leaving - only the narrowest of little 
alleyways to serve for light and air and passage. 
Only the peristyle of the palace was left free to 
serve as a public square, and even here the 
beautiful columns of red syenite have been 
roughly hacked into and used as supports for 
the wretched little houses which have grown up 
between them. 

At the end of the peristyle is the entrance to 
the temple, guarded on one side by an Egyptian 
sphinx of black granite. In the museum of the 
town is the body of the companion sphinx which 
formerly guarded the other side of the door- 
way, but long ago on some unlucky day it 
lost its head and was removed from its post 
of duty. The head has since reappeared, built 
into the walls of the house of a citizen of the 
town, where it may be seen to-day, but per- 
suasions, bribes, and even the threats of the 
Austrian Government have as yet failed to 
convince this lover of art of the propriety of re- 
storing it to the headless body in the museum. 
We were conducted through the narrow streets 
of the old town to the cathedral, the temple of 
^Esculap, and the museum, by a man who is to 
Spalato to-day what Diocletian must have been 
in his time — the man of the place. It is he who 

65 



The Edge of the Orient 



has charge of all the restorations and repairs of 
the ancient monuments of the town. It is he who 
personally superintends the rebuilding- of the 
campanile. It is he who founded and directs the 
little museum where most of the treasures found 
at Salona are stored ; and it is he who attends to 
the welfare of the souls of the Spalatini of to-day. 
His card reads as follows : 



MSGR. FR. BULIC. 
Canierier de ho?ineur de S. S. Leon XIII. 
Directeur dn Gymnase et du Musee Archeologique 
Conservateur de la Commission Centrale ftour les monu- 
ments d'art et d'histoire 
Membre Correspondant de V Academie Jugoslave 
Membre ordinaire de FInstitut Archeologique Allemand 
SPALA TRO-DALMA TIE 

Autriche. 



Later in the day, in company with our reverend 
conductor, we climbed to the top of the scaffolding 
which surrounds the old campanile, toward the 
restoration of which the Austrian Government 
gives from thirty to forty thousand florins an- 
nually, and had an extensive view of the sur- 
rounding country, the plain of Salona, and the 
sea. There are many large vineyards all about 



66 



Trali and Spalato 



here, but in late years the wine industry has not 
prospered, as since the treaty with Italy, which 
allows of the competition of Italian wines in Aus- 
tria, the demand for the wine of Spalato has de- 
creased, and it may now be had at the rate of 
three or four cents a bottle. 

In the evening we went to a very new and 
modern theatre, which seemed entirely out of 
place in the old city, and heard a Bohemian opera 
troupe give the " Seven Ravens," which was de- 
scribed as follows on the programme : 

SEDAM GA VRANO VA 

Veliko carobiio djelo u ij slika 

Muzika raznih ucitelja. Upravitelj kapelnzk 

H. BENISEK. Redatelj L. Chmelensky 

and, to do the Bohemians justice, it sounded as 
bad as it looks. 

The next day we steamed away south again, 
past the island of Solta, the ancient Olynta, famed 
for its wonderful honey produced from the cistus 
rose and rosemary, and out into the blue Adriatic, 
which was as placid as an inland lake, and after 
rounding the point of Lesina, shaped our course 
for the island of Curzola. 



6 7 



IV 
CURZOLA AND RAGUSA 

The old city of Curzola, which lies at the eastern 
extremity of a fine wooded island of the same 
name, is chiefly known to fame on account of the 
great naval battle between the Genoese and the 
Venetians, which took place in the narrow chan- 
nel dividing the island from the long peninsula 
of Sabbioncello which juts out from the main 
land. Here the Genoese defeated the Venetians 
and captured the famous old navigator Marco 
Polo, who had just returned from the Chinese 
seas. Andrea Dandolo, the Venetian provvedi- 
tore, too proud to bear the ignominy of defeat, 
dashed out his brains against the side of the Geno- 
ese galley that was bearing him away as a prison- 
er of war, and Marco Polo was carried away to 
Genoa and thrust into a dungeon, where he wrote 
his wonderful book of travels. Before their de- 
feat by the Genoese the Venetians had experienced 
considerable difficulty in governing the little 
island, owing to the independent spirit of the 
Curzolani, who at times rose in open rebellion 



Curzola and Ragusa 




and defied their rulers. Count Zorzi, who en- 
deavored to extend his power in the island by 
making it an hereditary principality, was expelled 
from the city, and upon endeavoring with the aid 
of his armed fol- 
lowers to reinstate 
himself, he was de- ,J 
feated, losing: his i^l 
standard and re- 
ceiving man y 
wounds. Nothing 
daunted, this 
doughty warrior 
encamped Avithin 
sight of the strong 
walls of the town, 
raising for his stan- 
dard the bloody 
bandages from his 
wounded limbs, 
and, engaging the country people in his support, 
eventually regained and held the city. 

The wails of the old town, although now torn 
down in many places, still give evidence of their 
former strength, and some of the great stone 
bastions still look as grim and formidable as they 
must have done when Uliz-Ali, the Turkish cor- 
sair, came sailing into the harbor one fine morning 
to sack and burn the town. The Venetian gover- 

71 





Old Strong Tower. Curzola. 



The Edge of the Orient 



nor, hearing of the prospective visit of the corsair, 
had discreetly withdrawn his garrison and fled to 
Zara, but the cunning people of Curzola not being 
minded to give over their city to the Turks to be 
pillaged and despoiled, arrayed all the women 
and children of the place in armor and made such 
a brave showing on the walls and battlements 
that the corsair, thinking the garrison too strong 
for him, sailed away after firing a few cannon 
balls, which are still preserved in the old city 
as souvenirs of this visit. 

Curzola has also had a taste of British rule. 
The English took the town in 1813 and held it 
until 181 5, when, with the rest of Dalmatia, it was 
ceded to Austria. The old fort crowning the hill 
at the back of the town and commanding the har- 
bor is a relic of the English occupation. For the 
sightseer the resources of Curzola are not great. 
There are some quaint and pretty bits of archi- 
tecture, and curiously carved oraro^ovles jutting 
out from the eaves over the narrow streets, and in 
the piazza there is a diminutive column bearing a 
dilapidated and shame-faced looking little lion 
which, at the downfall of the republic, was dis- 
gracefully maltreated by a little apothecarv who, 
owing the dying government a grudge, re- 
lieved his pent up feelings on learning the news 
of its dissolution by going out in the square and 
brutally kicking the little stone lion's tail off and 



Curzola and Ragusa 



destroying his wings, which accounts for his 
present woe-begone appearance. When you have 
visited the old cathedral and have been led by a 
circuitous route to a little court-yard to inspect 
a bronze door knocker which is held in great 
esteem by the citizens, you have exhausted the 
stock sights of the town. In fact, the pleasantest 
thing you can do in Curzola is to walk outside the 
walls to the west, and sit in one of the busy little 
yards where the boat-builders are at work ; and 
there, with the fragrant odor of the pine-chips in 
your nostrils, listen to the lapping of the blue 
water against the quay which all but surrounds 
the old town, and mark the graceful outline of the 
lantern tower of the old Duomo outlined against 
the dark mountains of the opposite mainland. 

From Curzola to Ragusa is something over 
fifty miles. The steamer stops at Gravosa, the 
modern port, some two miles above the walls of 
the ancient republic, for the harbor of Ragusa 
itself affords but little protection from the stormy 
Adriatic. The drive to the old city from the fine 
harbor of Gravosa on a May morning is one of 
the most beautiful in the world. The road, skirt- 
ing the sea all the way, is perfumed by gardens in 
full bloom and great masses of roses hanging over 
old stone walls and iron gateways. Figs, date, 
palms, olives and agaves are all in luxuriant foli- 
age ; and below, dashing against the gray cliffs, is 

73 



The Edge of the Orient 



the beautiful blue water of the Adriatic, so clear 
that you can see the dark rocks twenty feet 
beneath the surface, and can distinguish the dart- 
ing bodies of the fish in the shallows. 

Presently you come to a piazza thickly shaded 
with mulberry- trees and having a low stone wall 
at one end on the cliff overlooking the sea ; a little 
beyond the piazza rise the massive walls of the old 
town, and crossing the moat you enter the Porta 
Pille — a gateway in one of the great bastions — 
and a winding way, descending between the great 
stone walls, leads you into the principal street of 
Ragusa, the Corso. 

Old Ragusa has seen many vicissitudes. Found- 
ed by Roman refugees, for a long period it flour- 
ished under Byzantine rule and protection, and 
had grown strong enough within its moats and 
walls to withstand a fifteen months' siege by the 
Saracens in the ninth century. Its old houses 
were built for the most part of wood from the 
pine forests of Mount Sergius, which rises behind 
it, at one time so thickly wooded as to bestow 
upon the city the Illyric name of Dubrovnik, or 
" woody " — a sad misnomer to-day, as the old 
mountain has been shorn of its forests for centu- 
ries and now rises as sterile and bare as though 
it had never known a tree. 

In the early part of the fourteenth century the 
" Black Death " visited the old town and num- 

74 




Si 



Curzola and Ragusa 



bered for its victims eleven thousand citizens, 
more than the entire population of the city to-day. 
A relic of this scourge is preserved in San Biagio 
in the shape of an old crucifix, which was vowed 
at that time, and San Biagio itself, the votive 
church, was built as a memorial of this terrible 
visitation. After the city had recovered some- 
what from this sore blow the present enormous 
fortifications were built, and again Ragusa en- 
tered on a prosperous career, which attained its 
height in the early part of the sixteenth century, 
when the commerce of the old city had been ex- 
tended to all the principal ports of the Mediter- 
ranean, and its argosies sailed even beyond the 
pillars of Hercules. (The word argosy, or ra- 
gosy, is said to have meant originally a ship of 
Ragusa.) Then came the earthquakes, which did 
such damage to the city and were such a menace 
to the safety of the inhabitants that the good citi- 
zens carved the letters I. H. S. over their stone 
doorways as a sort of Passover mark or suppli- 
cation to Providence to protect them. Before 
the shocks of the earthquakes had ceased came 
the plague of 1526, during which twenty thou- 
sand citizens died. Then their misfortunes ceased 
for a time, only to be repeated in a later century 
by the great earthquake of 1667, which destroyed 
almost all the buildings of the town, over five 
thousand citizens perishing in the ruins. 

77 



The Edge of the Orient 



In addition to all these calamities, Ragusa had 
many battles to fight, not only for itself, but for 
the more powerful and ambitious States of Hun- 




Cloister of the Dominican Monastery, Ragusa. 



gary and Austria, who pressed the small republic 
into their service, and hundreds of Ragusan gal- 
leys and thousands of Ragusan lives were sacri- 
ficed in fighting battles that were not their own; so 

7 8 



Curzola and Ragusa 



that, taking all things into consideration, it speaks 
well for the vitality of the old city that there is 
anything remaining of it to-day to tell the tale of 
its long struggle against its varied misfortunes. 

One of the first places of interest after coming 
within the walls of Ragusa is Mala Braca, the old 
Franciscan church and convent, with its fine 
cloister and brown-robed monks, and near by is 
an old Venetian fountain or reservoir, where the 
water, led into the city through pipes laid to the 
hills behind, was stored. The Corso, which is 
surprising^ broad and straight for a Dalmatian 
city, is made picturesque by the many little open 
shops, after the manner of Oriental bazars, where 
Albanian tailors sit cross-legged working curious 
embroidered patterns on the scarlet waistcoats 
and gorgeous jackets worn by the country people 
about here. Silversmiths are at work on filigree 
ornaments for the women or buttons for the jack- 
ets of the men ; and shop-windows, hung with 
cheap silk scarfs and gay prints of brilliant colors, 
attract the country people, with whom the streets 
are filled. The most picturesque of these peas- 
ants are the Canalesi women, with their peculiar 
head-dresses and elaborate jackets richly embroid- 
ered in gold and silver, and their gay-colored 
torbas, a kind of gigantic reticule which they in- 
variably carry with them, slung over their shoul- 
ders by its drawing-strings. The men from the 



The Edge of the Orient 



same district wear full Turkish costume, blue 
trousers, red fezzes, and short jackets extravagant- 




A Canalesi Woman. 



ly embroidered. The Canali was formerly Sutto- 
rino, a Turkish enclave. 

At the end of the Corso is the clock-tower, 
where a bronze knight in armor stands beside 
the great bell, sledge in hand, ready to strike the 



82 



Curzola and Ragiisa 



alarm and assemble the citizens of the town 
which he guards, in the piazza below him. Here 
is also the Church of San Biagio, the patron saint 
of the city, and in front oi its door is a statue 
of Orlando, erected to commemorate the inde- 
pendence of Ragusa. From the stone pillar be- 
hind the statue the herald, with a flare of trum- 
pets, used to announce the decrees of the judges 
to the assembled citizens, and in front of the 
statue condemned criminals were executed. Be- 
yond is the interesting Palazzo Communale, 
formerly the rector's palace, which, although 
almost entirely destroyed by the earthquake 
of 1667, has been restored, and still preserves 
much of the curious and well-wrought stone 
carving with which it was adorned. Still farther 
along is the Piazza dell' Erbe, a busy and pict- 
uresque square, especially on market-days, when 
it is enlivened by the gay costumes of the Cana- 
lesi and a mixture of variously costumed peas- 
ants from over the mountains ; turbaned Bosni- 
ans and Herzegovinians, and tall, fierce-looking 
Montenegrins, with their picturesque, long white 
coats and red and black caps. 

Retracing our steps for a short distance, we find 
a way which leads to the outer fortification on 
the harbor. Here, as on the other side of the city, 
the tremendous walls and massive bastions, which 
seem to have been built for all time, impress you 

83 



The Edge of the Orient 




Approach to Ragusa. 

with the former strength of the old city. In the 
drainage-holes left in the walls by the old build- 
ers thousands of pigeons have built their nests, 
and their metallic breasts, shining in the sunlight 
from every niche, emphasize the peace that has 
settled upon these old fortifications after the 
centuries of battle and siege that they have 
withstood. Beyond the outer gate of the for- 
tifications runs the high road to Trebinje, in the 
Herzegovina. If you follow this for about two 
miles it will bring you to a point high above the 
sea, where you can command a beautiful view of 
old Ragusa, with its triple walls and great moat 
dividing it from the mountain, which rises so pre- 
cipitously in its rear that even the high road has 
no room to pass outside the walls, but must enter 
the gates and pass through the town to reach the 
farther side. 

A little way out in the blue water lies the 
green-bowered island of La Croma, at one time 
the property of Prince Rudolph, but now restored 



Curzola and Ragusa 



by the Austrian Crown to the Dominican monks, 
whose ancient monastery, transformed into an im- 
perial chateau during the tenure of the Austrian 
Crown, was founded by Richard Cceur de Lion, 
who, narrowly escaping shipwreck in these wa- 
ters, built a chapel on this island, where he first 
touched his foot to dry land. 

On a bare, isolated rock toward the north of 
Ragusa, towers the grim old fortress of San Lo- 
renzo, and beyond, on a little point stretching 
into the sea, is the luxuriant garden of the Conte 
Pozza, with its bowers of roses and its wealth of 
tropical vegetation. Farther on, toward the 
northwest, a little group of rocky islands, which 
turn to purple shadows in the sunset, lift their 
heads above the sea. Nowhere in the world is 
there a more beautiful view, and nowhere in the 
world is there a more perfect example of an old 
mediaeval town w 7 ith ancient walls and great bat- 
tlements, deep moats and strong towers, draw- 
bridges, and sally-ports, from which, so visionary 
does it all seem, you half-expect to see a goodly 
company of King Arthur's knights ride forth on 
their quest of the Holy Grail. 

At sunset we walked back along the cactus- 
lined road to the city gates, catching a glimpse 
on the way of a long white yacht, which glided 
silently into the little harbor near La Crorna and 
quietly dropped anchor in the still water. 

8s 



The Edge of the Orient 



Then we found our way through the streets of 
the old town to the Porta Pille, on the northern 
side, where our charioteer awaited, and drove 
along through the cool and perfumed night-air to 
the wharf at Gravosa, where our steamer was in 
waiting. Near the wharf a band of dark-skinned 
Servian gypsies had pitched their tents for the 
night — miserable low shelters like those of the 
Bedouins — and toward the mouth of the harbor, 
barely distinguishable in the dusk, lay the dull, 
gray mass of an Austrian man-of-war which had 
just arrived, bringing the Archduke Albrecht 




The Moat and Land Walls. Ragusa. 



Curzola and Ragusa 



to review the Austrian garrison stationed near 
Gravosa. After dinner we sat on deck and 
smoked our pipes in the still air until the bells of 
the warship rang the hour for retiring ; and when 
we awoke in the morning Ragusa, the old re- 
public, had vanished like a dream, and we were 
far out on the blue waters of the broad Adriatic. 



V 
CATTARO AND MONTENEGRO 

HIGH up in the fastness of the desolate and in- 
accessible black mountains, which have given 
it its name, in a little world of its own, shut in by 
barren peaks which reach the clouds, and prac- 
tically cut off from all the civilizing and progres- 
sive influences of the century, lies the sturdy 
little highland principality of Montenegro. Dur- 
ing the five hundred years of its existence this 
little State has maintained its independence 
against tremendous odds with such marvellous 
persistency and valor that no less a student than 
Mr. Gladstone has stated that, in his deliberate 
opinion, " the traditions of Montenegro exceed in 
glory those of Marathon, Thermopylae, and all 
the war traditions of the world." 

Toward the end of the fourteenth century a 
number of Servian fugitives, driven from their 
country by the victorious hordes of the Turks 
after the ruin of the Servian cause at the battle 
of Kossovo, took refuge in these bleak and sterile 
mountains, and with one of the Baltscha princes 

88 



Gittaro and Montenegro 



t> j 



at their head established their independence at a 
time when all of Southeastern Europe was trem- 
bling- before the power of the Turks, who had 
forced their way to the very gates of Vienna. 
This independence they have maintained up to 
the present day, and their whole history from 
that time to the present is comprised in an un- 
ending warfare with their hereditary enemies. 
Time and a^ain have the Turks sent <rreat 
armies of from forty thousand to two hundred 
thousand men against these gallant highlanders, 
and time and again have thev been repulsed with 
the loss of from ten to thirty thousand men by 
the valiant little army of hardy mountaineers, for 
whom warfare was the sole pursuit in life. 

In 1604 eight thousand Montenegrin warriors 
defeated an army of sixty thousand Turks. In 
1623 Suleiman Pasha invaded the country with a 
vast army, burning and destroying the towns and 
villages, but failing to conquer the people. In 
1703 the Montenegrins, in revenge for Turkish 
outrages upon the border, offered to every Turk 
within the principality the alternative of baptism 
or death, and on Christmas-eve this decree was 
rigorously carried out, and every Moslem within 
the land who would not be baptized was put to 
the sword on this night of Montenegrin vespers. 
In 1706 a fresh invasion by the Turks was re- 
pelled with loss, and one hundred and fifty-seven 



The Edge of the Orient 



Turkish prisoners were ignominiously ransomed 
for the same number of pigs. In 171 1 the Monte- 
negrins invaded Turkish territory at the instance 
of Russia, and when a counter-invasion took 
place drove back the infidels and captured 
eighty-six standards. In 17 14 one hundred and 
twenty thousand Turks under the Grand Vizier 
Kuprili invaded the country, burned Cettinje, and 
drove the people to the mountains ; they then 
withdrew for the conquest of Morea, carrying off 
two thousand captives. Fresh invasions con- 
stantly took place from 171 8 to 1796, when the 
Montenegrins under Peter I. gained the most 
decisive victory of all over their hereditary foe. 

Although since the treaty of Berlin, in 1878, 
Montenegro has acquired twenty-five miles of 
seacoast and two ports of its own on the Adri- 
atic — Dulcigno and Antivari — the Dalmatian 
port of Cattaro has always been and still contin- 
ues to be the Montenegrins' principal avenue 
of commercial and social intercourse with the 
world. Far down at the lower extremity of Dal- 
matia, where its territory is so attenuated as to 
form but a narrow ribbon on the map, just wide 
enough to close out that part of Montenegro 
from the sea, a narrow opening in the rocky 
shore between the Punta d'Ostro and the Punta 
d'Arza leads into the famous Bocche di Cattaro, 

probably the finest and most beautiful harbor in 

90 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



the world. This magnificent water-way consists 
of a chain of five great basins, joined by narrow 
channels winding their way between the great 
ranges of bleak and sterile mountains which rise 
precipitously from the borders of these inland 
seas, barely leaving room here and there for the 
sparkling little white towns surrounded by their 
ancient walls, to obtain a foothold at their base. 

Into this great chain of inland lakes we sailed 
one morning at daybreak, and as we reached the 
narrowest division of waters, known as " le ca- 
tene," where in former times a chain was stretched 
across to defend the innermost harbors, the mist 
which overhung the water began to rise, and 
under the slowly rolling gray curtain we saw the 
great lead-colored hulks of the Austrian navy 
steaming grandly out, each great ship attended 
by three or four little noisy black torpedo boats, 
puffing energetically along on either side of their 
consorts like little children afraid of being left 
behind. Farther on, forming a peaceful contrast 
to the huge war vessels, as they moved majesti- 
cally through the narrow pass, were two tiny 
islands barely raising themselves above the level 
of the water. On one of these stands the minia- 
ture monastery of San Giorgio, with chapel and 
cloisters and garden complete ; and on the other 
is a little pilgrimage church, Santa Maria dello 
Scarpello, in which is a portrait of the Madonna, 

93 



The Edge of the Orient 



said to have been painted by St. Luke. The 
white walls, red-tiled roofs, and green domes of 
the little church, which seems to float on the 
water like a lily-pad, makes a charming bit of 




Santa Maria dello Scarpello. 

color against the bleak, gray mountain - side, 
which rises majestically behind to such heights 
that the tiny church in the foreground seems no 
bigger than a child's toy. 

Beyond the islands lies the pretty little town of 
Perasto, guarding the entrance to the Bay of Ri- 
sano, on the farther shore of which, high up on 
the mountain-side, a great fountain bursts forth 
from the solid rock and falls in white foam down 

94 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



the . heer cliffs into the sea below. Higher up on 
the same mountain can be seen the mouth of a 
dark cavern in which is a great subterranean lake, 
the abode, according to local tradition, of a great 
dragon, who lies in its depths guarding an enor- 
mous diamond between his paws. Certain it is 
that strange rumbling noises are often heard pro- 
ceeding from the very heart of the mountain, and 
at such times, you are told, the mighty dragon is 
at play and, in his sport, rolls the huge diamond 
about in the depths of his gloomy cavern — a Dal- 
matian Fafner as yet unconquered, awaiting the 
Siegfried who shall despoil him of his treasure. 

From Perasto we steer south into the last of 
this wonderful chain of inland seas, and after pass- 
ing Perzanio are shut in on every side by the 
great sterile mountains. At the extreme end of 
the bay towers the huge Lovcen, one of the black 
mountains of Montenegro, and at its base, be- 
tween two torrents which issue from the solid 
rock, is the little white town of Cattaro, clinging 
tenaciously to the meagre foothold it has obtained 
at the foot of the stupendous cliffs which tower 
thousands of feet above it, dwarfing the little col- 
lection of houses to the proportions of a Noah's- 
ark village, an impression still further heightened 
by the little rows of round green trees set at reg- 
ular distances apart along the broad stone quay. 
Behind the cathedral this great drop-curtain of 

97 



The Edge of the Orient 



stone descends so closely that the towers seem- 
ingly guard an entrance to some great cavern in 
the living rock behind. 

So shut in among the great masses of towering 
crags which surround it is this little town that a 
Greek historian has stated that the sun never 
reached it except in summer. This statement is 
not exactly borne out by the truth, although in 
the winter months the sun only reaches the city 
for five hours each day. 

At one side of the town a great buttressed wall, 
part of the city's old defenses, makes its devious 
way from the water's edge to a point some fifteen 
hundred feet above the town, where it terminates 
at an old castle perched on the edge of a great 
ravine. Far above, stretching for miles along the 
precipitous side of the great mountain, is the faint 
line of the famous Ladder of Cattaro, the old mule 
track which follows the gorge of the torrent 
Fiumara, and at last, with innumerable zigzags, 
surmounts the face of Lovcen and leads over the 
wastes of barren rock to the mountain strong- 
holds of the invincible Montenegrins. The other 
side of the town is protected by a sheer preci- 
pice of rock which descends to the water, and 
here a frail little bridge leads from under the 
great stone tower of the old wall over the Gor- 
dicchio to the wonderfully well engineered car- 
riage road that leads to Cettinje. 




The Cathedral. Cattaro. 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



Saturday is the great market day in Cattaro, 
and all along the quay and outside the Porta Fiu- 
mara the Montenegrins, after complying with 
the Austrian regulations by leaving their fire- 
arms in a house provided for the purpose, hold 
market and sell their livestock and produce, or 
exchange it for the merchandise of the Cattaro 
shopkeepers. The poor Montenegrin women, 
who conduct these markets, have a hard struggle 
for existence. They are the workers and the 
tillers of the soil, and all their merchandise is the 
fruit of their unaided toil, as the men reserve their 
strength for warlike pursuits and in time of peace 
spend their time in swaggering about the streets, 
smoking and talking of war and rumors of war, 
while the poor women work for them, tilling the 
land with wooden ploughs or staggering up and 
down the steep mountain-paths under enormous 
burdens. 

These poor creatures, broken and bent by toil 
before they are twenty-five, leave their little 
stone huts in the mountains at two or three 
o'clock in the morning, and with a load of sixty 
pounds or more on their backs, make their way 
down the precipitous path of the Ladder of Cat- 
taro, and after a weary day spent in disposing of 
their merchandise, they shoulder great bags of 
flour and meal, bought with the proceeds of their 
sales, and painfully and laboriously make their 



The Edge of the Orient 



way up the side of the sheer rock to the little 
huts far up in the Black Mountains, which they 
reach late in the night, weary and worn with 
their exhausting labors. 

There are no railroads in Montenegro, and un- 
til recently there was not even a carriage-road to 
Cettinje, as the policy of these canny highlanders 
has always been to keep their little capital as in- 
accessible as possible, for their greatest strength 
lay in the difficult approaches to their strong- 
holds. Recently, however, the Austrians have 
persuaded Prince Nicholas to construct a road 
from Cettinje to the frontier, where, high on the 
mountain-side, it joins the admirably engineered 
road which the Austrians have built to scale the 
precipitous mountain-side. Starting from the 
quay one morning in a little yellow ramshackle, 
four-wheeled vehicle of a nondescript type, hav- 
ing three shaggy and under-fed little mountain 
horses, fastened together in a bunch with ropes 
and strings, to draw it, we crossed the little bridge 
over the Gordicchio and commenced the ascent 
to the mountain stronghold. The road at first 
led directly away from the Montenegrin frontier, 
through a beautiful valley shaded with great oak- 
trees. Then for a time it wound back and forth 
under the sinister shadow of an Austrian fort, 
which has been so placed as to command nearly 
every foot of the eight or nine miles of roadway 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



leading to the Montenegrin frontier, which, al- 
though only a few hundred yards distant horizon- 
tally from Cattaro, is so high up in the clouds as 
to necessitate the construction of over eight miles 
of road to reach it. 

In many places you can leave your conveyance 
and by climbing straight up over the rocks for 
a short distance, gain fifteen or twenty minutes 
over the ragged little horses, who toil patiently 
along on the zigzag path of the road beneath you. 

There is no grander sight in the world than 
these beautiful basins of still blue water sur- 
rounded by the majestic piles of barren rock with 
the little fringe of verdant shore at its base, as 
seen from this wonderful mountain road ; and the 
intervals of rest, in which you can view the won- 
derful panorama spread out below you, well re- 
pay the trouble of scrambling up the steep rocks. 

At last the innumerable zigzags end, the road 
trends upward in a long ascending line, and pres- 
ently a row of little white stones laid obliquely 
across the road, in default of custom-houses and 
barriers, proclaims the frontier of Montenegro ; 
and here many a hardy mountaineer, whom 
chance has some time exiled from his native land, 
has fallen on his face in the road and kissed the 
dust from the stones in grateful joy at his return 
to the Black Mountains of his fatherland. A little 

farther on, at a sharp turn in the road, we came 

io 5 



The Edge of the Orient 



upon a little group of the Black Mountaineers, 
with rifles slung- over their backs and their belts 
stuck full of revolvers, knives, and yatagans, 
standing at the mouth of a dark cavern, which 
leads for a mile or more into the mountain-side. 
Then we reached a little mountain inn, a welcome 
shelter from the cold misty air, and refreshed 
ourselves with coarse bread, cheese, and red wine, 
which was provided for us by a dark-eyed Mon- 
tenegrin woman in the picturesque peasant cos- 
tume of rough, homespun woollen, a white waist 
under a long white coat trimmed with blue and 
elaborately embroidered, a coarse, dark woollen 
skirt, and sandals or opankas of undressed hide, 
laced across the top with thongs of leather. 

From the inn the road leads by a slight descent 
to the little town of Njegus, the ancestral home 
of the reigning family of Montenegro and one of 
the country-seats of the present prince. The poor 
little thatched houses of the town are no better 
than stables ; but it is a brave little community, 
and has often sent three hundred and fifty of its 
five hundred men to the wars. Here you get 
some idea of the extreme difficulty with which 
the Montenegrin labors to get a bare living from 
the barren and unfruitful land in which he lives. 
Little patches of ground no bigger than tennis- 
courts are carefully cultivated, and wherever 
there is the slightest deposit of soil on the sides 



106 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



of the mountains or in the hollows of the rocks a 
little stone wall is built about it to prevent its 
washing away, and it is cherished and tended as 




In the Black Mountains. 



carefully as a window-garden, so that it shall add 

its full quota to the scant crops of the country. 

Agriculture here is conducted much as it was in 

the time of the Trojan wars. The ploughs are of 

wood and the harrows of thorns or rods, and near 

109 



The Edge of the Orient 



every little patch of cultivated land you may see 
a little stone ring where the harvest of wheat is 
threshed out by horses, who tread it out as they 
are driven round and round about a post in the 
centre. 

From Njegus the road ascends again to the 
pass of Kruacko Zdrjelo, where at the summit a 
wonderful view is presented. There is a legend 
current here that, having created the world, God 
saw that it was good — in parts — but that the rocks 
and stones made by Satanael were harmful and 
hateful, whereupon he sent his angel Gabriel to 
gather them up and cast them into the deep sea. 
So Gabriel filled an enormous sack with all the 
rocks and cliffs of the world, and flew with his 
burden toward the blue Adriatic, but Satanael, 
flying fast behind, cut a hole in the sack, there- 
upon all the rocks dropped out, forming the moun- 
tains of Montenegro and Dalmatia, and when 
Gabriel reached the Adriatic the sack was empty. 

From this high pass in the Black Mountains the 
reason for the origin of the legend is apparent, 
for nowhere in the world is there a more desolate 
expanse of tumbling rocks and crags. Looking 
north toward Niksic, as far as the eye can reach 
tosses a great sea of barren rocky peaks of gray 
limestone, a veritable picture of utter desolation 
with hardly a trace of vegetation of any sort to 
be seen. Far off in the south shines the glint of 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



water in the Lake of Scutari ; to the right towers 
the huge Lovcen, and on its side is the Chapel of 
St. Peter, the patron saint of Montenegro. St. 
Peter is rather a home-made saint, with a dis- 
tinctly modern flavor, as he did not die until 1830 
and was immediately canonized by his nephew, 
Peter the Second, who wanted a saint in the fam- 
ily ; and as many of the older men in Montenegro 
to-day knew St. Peter intimately during his life 
and can therefore vouch for his special fitness for 
the position he holds, he has proved a popular 
and favorite divinity. 

From here the road descends rapidly into the 
basin of an old lake which at one time filled the 
valley where Cettinje now stands, and presently 
we obtain a glimpse of the red roofs and white- 
washed houses of the smallest capital in Europe, 
and after a few more devious twistings among 
the foothills we drove past a little Greek church 
and entered the main street, which leads through 
the town to the little inn at the farther end. The 
streets were filled with tall, fine-looking men in 
picturesque white coats, embroidered waistcoats, 
baggy dark-blue breeches, and high boots, and 
each man, as compelled by law, wore a loaded re- 
volver in his belt as well as a miscellaneous col- 
lection of knives and short swords. Even the 
waiters at the inn wore top boots and carried 
knives and revolvers. 



The Edge of the Orient 



The inn itself is not calculated to render a long 
sojourn in Cettinje particularly fascinating-. The 
room assigned to us contained four double beds 




Cettinje, the Capital City. 

and no wash-stand. I finally procured a tin basin 
and a wooden chair, Avhich served as a wash-stand 
and towel-rack, and a bucket of water. The only 
method of disposing of a basin of water seemed 
to be to throw it out of the window. I did this 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



successfully on the night of our arrival, but on 
repeating it in the morning I heard a shout 
from below, and on looking out found that 1 had 
drenched a doughty highland warrior, who, upon 
seeing my head at the window, proceeded to make 
a demonstration with the aid of the extensive col- 
lection of firearms in his belt. I had been told 
that the Montenegrin was extremely courteous to 
those who spoke his language, so I immediately 
put in use the two words I had just learned from 
a phrase book, " Dobro jutro," meaning " good 
morning," to which I added in English, for lack of 
any further Slavish vocabulary : " Have you used 
Pear's soap?" This did not seem to have any 
immediate effect in pacifying him, so I discreet- 
ly withdrew from his gaze, resolving in the fut- 
ure to make cautious and careful surveys of the 
ground immediately beneath the windows, and 
avoid wittingly dispensing any more free shower- 
baths to these walking arsenals. 

The stock sights of a capital so small that one 
could stand in its very centre and throw stones 
into the suburbs are necessarily limited. A large, 
square, low-roofed building, two stories high and 
painted a dingy yellow, with a little wooden sen- 
try-box on either side of the front-door steps, is 
the new palace of the Prince. A little beyond 
this is the old Biljar or palace, enclosed within a 
high stone wall and guarded by four round tow- 

"3 



The Edge of the Orient 



ers, now used as the palace of justice and the gov- 
ernment printing-office, where the " Glas Crna- 
gora," or " Voice of Montenegro," is published. 

Between the old and new palaces is the Tree of 
Justice, a great elm, where, as a last resort for all 
from the four or five courts of the country, peti- 
tioners may appeal to the Prince, who occasion- 
ally sits in paternal fashion beneath its branches 
and administers justice in person. 

The justice dispensed by the Prince is, at all 
events, summary. A visitor who attended one of 
these open-air courts on one occasion reports that 
the Prince named the petitioners collectively as 
liars, consigned the leader to jail, and threatened 
to send the others after him unless they speedily 
got out of the way. 

On the rocky slope behind the Biljar is the old 
Convent of the Virgin and the little convent 
church, which serves as the cathedral of Monte- 
negro, where St. Peter, the local saint, reposes in 
his sarcophagus. A little way above the convent 
is the famous round tower of Tabia, where, up to 
a few years ago, it was the pride of the Montene- 
grins to maintain a continuous display of Turks' 
heads, neatly arranged on poles stuck in the 
ground about the walls, and Avhere the hollow 
vault is still filled with Turkish skulls. 

Near by are the royal stables, where the Prince 

keeps several fine Arabs, and the national jail, a 

ii 4 




Prince Nicholas I, of Montenegro. 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



remarkable institution, where a few prisoners 
lounge about in the open doorways, smoking 
cigarettes and apparently enjoying to the full the 
freedom and hospitality -of this unique prison. 
Some of the prisoners are manacled by chains fas- 
tened to the left leg and arm, or, in some cases, to 
both ankles. The inconvenience of the latter 
method, in which the chain is supposed to drag 
on the ground, has been overcome by the in- 
genuity of the wearers, who attach a cord to the 
centre and suspend it from their waists, making 
the decoration rather ornamental than otherwise. 
Many of the prisoners are entirely unencumbered, 
and there is apparently no reason why they should 
not make their escape if they wished to do so, but 
they evidently prefer the tempered joys of this 
metropolitan confinement to the hardships inci- 
dent to a fugitive existence in the surrounding 
mountains. 

Across the town from the jail and the palace is 
the new theatre, built by an American named 
Slade — a rough, unfinished-looking building, which 
is intended to eventually serve as casino, museum, 
and reading-rooms, as well as the home of the 
Montenegrin drama. In the bare, white-washed 
hall of this building are produced the plays writ- 
ten by the Prince, who is a poet and dramatist, 
and has written two plays, " The Empress of the 

Balkans " and " Prince Arbanit." 

ii 7 



The Edge of the Orient 



We were not so fortunate as to see either of 
these royal dramas, although we saw a Servian 
company from Belgrade in a curious play, inter- 
spersed with songs and dances, enacted with as 
much force and power as could well be exerted 
on a ten by twelve stage, lighted by a dingy little 
row of smoking kerosene lamps without reflectors. 

The Crown Prince had been expected to attend 
the performance and encourage the performers 
by his royal patronage, but we watched in vain 
for his appearance in the royal box, which was 
prodigally hung with faded red canton flannel ; but 
the Crown Prince is a shy young man, and, hear- 
ing that there were strangers in town, he aban- 
doned the play and stayed at home in his konak 
rather than run the chance of being stared at by 
strangers. There were no women in the audience, 
the Montenegrin men evidently considering it 
bad form to be seen in public with the women of 
their families. 

At the farther end of the town from the inn is 
the national arsenal, where are stored two siege 
guns, two bronze Russian twelve-pounders, eigh- 
teen small Krupp guns, and twenty-four mountain 
guns, with a quantity of rifles and small arms. A 
big room in the arsenal is used as a war museum, 
and is filled with trophies captured from the 
Turks. Here are preserved hundreds of bullet- 
riddled flags and standards shot to ribbons in 

118 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



their desperate affrays, curved swords, Turkish 
cannon, guns, pistols, decorations and medals — 
among the latter being a number of Crimean war 




Girl of Montenegro. 



medals taken from Turks who had fought side by 
side with the English in the Crimea. 

There is a small market-square, with a rude little 



no 



The Edge of the Orient 



fountain in the centre, which is rendered pict- 
uresque by the bright costumes of the peasants 
on market days, and there is a school for girls 
founded and supported by the Dowager Empress 
of Russia. Along the main street are little shops 
where gunsmiths and silversmiths can be seen 
at work in the windows ; tobacconists, where big 
rolls of dark-blue paper, filled with the fine, golden 
tobacco of Scutari, are stacked on the shelves 
about the walls ; tiny bazaars of general supplies, 
where the red pork-pie cap, with its covering of 
black silk and the initials N. I., gaily colored tor- 
bas or pouches ; and the struka, a long brown 
shawl — which is to the Montenegrin what the 
plaid is to the Highlander — are the most con- 
spicuous articles displayed for sale. 

These, with the post-office, where you buy Mon- 
tenegrin stamps from a postmaster who wears 
two huge revolvers in his belt and has others in 
easy-reaching distance, and the small one-story 
buildings occupied by the representatives of for- 
eign powers and emblazoned over the doorways 
with their coats-of-arms, comprise all the institu- 
tions of the little capital. 

The rulers of Montenegro have always been 
warriors of renown. Their patron saint, Peter I., 
was a great general in his day, and in 1796, at 
Kroussa, he gained a most decisive victory over 
the Turks, whom he utterly defeated, inflicting a 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



loss upon them of over thirty thousand men, in- 
cluding their leader, Kara Mahmoud, whose head 




Montenegrin Peasants. 



for a long time after was displayed by the future 
saint as one of his most cherished possessions. 

His nephew, Peter II., who succeeded him in 
1830, was one of the foremost Servian poets of 



The Edge of the Orient 



the time ; and, although his energies were princi- 
pally directed toward the civilization of his people, 
the suppression of the vendetta and the establish- 
ment of security and order in his dominion, yet 
he had the martial spirit strongly within him, and 
commanded the respect of his troops, who had 
often seen this great bishop and leader of theirs, 
who was no less than six feet eight in height, 
stand before them in his robes and hit lemons 
with his rifle as they were thrown into the air by 
an attendant. This picturesque figure was the 
last Yladika, or ruler combining the temporal and 
spiritual power, for his nephew, Danilo II., who 
succeeded him in 185 1, separated the two and 
founded an absolute principality to be governed 
by secular princes. Danilo waged war upon the 
Turks, and administered a severe defeat to Omar 
Pasha at Grahovo in 1858, but he did not prove 
a popular ruler, and in i860 he was assassinated, 
and the succession passed to his nephew, Prince 
Nicholas I., Petrovic Njegos, the present ruler. 

Prince Nicholas, who is a fine-looking man of 
about fifty-five, was educated at Trieste and Paris 
and was proclaimed Prince on August 14, i860. 
He has fairly won his spurs in his battles with the 
Turks, defeating them in 1861-62, and also in 
1877-78, when, to aid Russia, he engaged nearly 
ninety thousand Turkish troops, who were drawn 
away from the Danube at a critical time for Rus- 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



sia, and with a vastly inferior force defeated them 
repeatedly, finally driving them from his dominion 
after they had sustained a loss of six thousand 
killed and many more thousands wounded. In 
one battle, at Kristatz, two thousand Montene- 
grins withstood thirty thousand Turks under 
Suleiman Pasha, with a loss of seven hundred, the 
Turks losing over thirty-five hundred ; while at 
Jezero the Montenegrins killed over four hundred 
and eighty Turks, with a loss to themselves of 
only thirteen killed and twenty-three wounded. 
As an example of the courage of the Montenegrin 
warriors in this battle, an English newspaper cor- 
respondent, who was in Montenegro at the time, 
relates the following incident : " The battle of 
Jezero was signalized on the part of the Montene- 
grins by a splendid individual valor, which cer- 
tainly deserves chronicling. A Montenegrin of 
the tribe of Piperi, Luka Philipov by name, had 
distinguished himself at the battle of Vucidol by 
taking Osman Pasha alive and carrying him bodily 
to Prince Nikola, who presented the gallant fellow 
with five hundred ducats for his prize, and jest- 
ingly bade him bear him another Turk in the same 
fashion. Now, for a Montenegrin to be told by 
" The Master — " " The Gospodar," as the Prince 
is generally called here — to do a thing is for him 
to do it or die. Accordingly, our hero of Piperi, 
being present at the battle of Jezero, and mindful 



123 



The Edge of the Orient 



of the master's orders, seized the moment of at- 
tack to rush into the Turkish lines, hug a true be- 
liever around the waist with a bearlike embrace, 
and lug him off bodily, disarming him by the way. 
To carry his prize safely to the rear the Monte- 
negrin made a slight detour, but he had not gone 
half-way to the Montenegrin position for which 
he was making when a bullet struck him, passing 
through both thigh bones, and letting go his cap- 
tive, he fell heavily to the ground. The Turk, 
with a shout of triumph, sprang upon his fallen 
captor, but despite the agony in which he lay, 
the Black Mountaineer retained strength of body 
and presence of mind sufficient for the occasion. 
He laid one hand heavily upon the Turk, who had 
sprung at his throat, and with the other pointed 
his revolver at his adversary's head, quietly re- 
marking : " Now, then, Turk, if you don't want to 
be blown into another world, just lift me on your 
back. And now, my fine horse," as the cowed 
and astonished Turk complied, " just trot me to 
my friends out there ! " Kismet being obviously 
against him, the Moslem obeyed his driver, and 
stumbled on over the rocks, groaning under the 
weight of the burly Montenegrin, to where the 
men of Piperi stood marvelling at the approach 
of what they believed to be a Turkish Goliath, 
ten feet tall ! But the warriors burst into a roar 
of laughter when, on the apparition approaching 



124 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



nearer, they perceived their wounded Luka rid- 
ing the reluctant Turk into their lines, where, 
after having presented his steed to the Prince, he 
fell senseless to the ground." 

Another characteristic incident occurred dur- 
ing the siege of Niksic, when Pope Milo, the he- 
roic priest and warrior of the Montenegrins, chal- 
lenged the infidel to single combat between the 
lines. The Turks accepted the challenge and 
sent out their most redoubtable swordsman, and 
the armies ceased hostilities to witness this hand- 
to-hand combat. The Turk proved himself a bet- 
ter swordsman than the priest, and killed him and 
severed his head from his body ; but his triumph 
was short lived, as immediately upon the resump- 
tion of hostilities he was served in the same way 
by an infuriated Montenegrin in revenge for the 
death of Pope Milo. 

At the fall of Niksic the Prince, who had been 
in active command of the long siege, during 
which the Montenegrin women had toiled inces- 
santly carrying cannon-balls and rations over the 
mountains to the besiegers, received the surren- 
der of Scanderbes: reclining: on his struka on a 
rock, and after he had taken coffee with the van- 
quished Turkish commander he composed a 
poem containing the news of his victory, com- 
mencing, " Niksic mourns, captive to-dav of my 
arms," which he sent to his wife at Cettinje, where 

125 



The Edge of the Orient 



the Princess read it to the citizens amid salvos 
of applause from their guns and pistols, and the 
ringing of the monastery bells ; while the metro- 




Montenegrins. 



politan or archbishop of Montenegro formed a 
ring for the war-dance or "Horo," and the blind 

minstrels tuned their one - stringed guzlas and 

126 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



sang the song of the " Green Apple Tree," which 
recites the valorous deeds of Montenegrin he- 
roes. 

Since 1878 there has been no active warfare in 
Montenegro, and the mountain warriors have had 
to content themselves with occasional raids into 
the neighboring provinces, and even this has 
lately been done away with, owing to the watch- 
ful eye of the Austrians on the north and the 
pacific policy of the Turks on the south. This 
enforced peace cannot last long, however, for the 
Montenegrin can never forget that it was the 
Turk who, five hundred years ago, drove him 
from his fertile fields and luxuriant valleys about 
the old Serbian capital of Prisrend, and shut him 
up in the barren, inaccessible prison among the 
rocks, where he now lives, and, not content to let 
him rest in peace even there while still uncon- 
quered, has over and over again, in the centuries 
that have followed, sent great armies against him 
to conquer and subdue or, if possible, exterminate 
his government and destroy his autonomy. How- 
ever, Prince Nicholas is a politic man, and three 
years ago, when the Sultan, anxious to propitiate 
his natural enemy, sent him a present of a com- 
plete equipment for a squadron of cavalry, he ac- 
cepted it without question, although it is hardly 
possible that he could use it in any way except 
offensively against the donor, and carried it up to 



The Edge of the Orient 



a place of safety in his stronghold among the 
mountain-tops. Then, turning his face toward 
Russia, Tie awaited the tidings from the north. 
They were not long in coming, for less than a 
year ago the Russian ship, Rostoff, from Cron- 
staclt, arrived in Antivari with thirty thousand 




A Mountain Lake. 



rifles, fifteen million cartridges, a number of can- 
non and machine guns, and a quantity of dyna- 
mite, all of which was a present from the Czar 
of Russia to Prince Nicholas I. of Montenegro. 
These weapons, added to the forty thousand rifles 
already in the country, would provide a rifle for 
almost every able-bodied man and woman in the 
whole principality, which has a population of less 



128 




Albanian Boy. 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



than two hundred thousand, the number of 
trained men liable to be called under arms being 
about thirty-five thousand. 

Since the receipt of this portentous present 
from the Czar the Prince has decided to main- 
tain a standing army. Hitherto, although every 
able-bodied man and youth was liable to serve in 
time of Avar, the standing army has consisted of 
thirty or forty men, who were usually engaged in 
playing at bowls in the Prince's back yard, a sim- 
ple, but convenient, arrangement of troops, allow- 
ing the Prince to accomplish the mobilization of 
his entire army by a low whistle from his back 
piazza in case of need. Now, however, the whole 
population will gradually be drilled in the use of 
the new arms provided by Russia, one section fol- 
lowing another in continuous service for three 
months. With his new weapons ready to his 
hand, who can blame the Montenegrin if at the 
first favorable opportunity he falls upon the Mos- 
lem, who destroyed the great Serbian kingdom 
of Stephen Duchan, which embraced Macedonia, 
Thessaly, Northern Greece, and Bulgaria, and 
drove him to his rocky eerie, among those barren 
crags, where for four or five centuries he has 
been shut out from the verdant and fruitful val- 
leys of his rightful heritage ? 

Prisrend, the ancient home of the old Serbian 
Czars, lies beyond the Albanian Mountains in the 



The Edge of the Orient 



southeast, and there is not in Montenegro to-day 
a Slav who does not await with impatience the 
battles that shall restore to. him the ancient heri- 
tage of his race. His national ballad or piesma 
is " Onamo, Onamo Za Br'da " (Out there, out 
there beyond the mountains), and as the Marsel- 
laise stirs the blood of the French or verses from 
the Koran frenzy the Moslem fanatic, so these 
lines thrill the heart of every Montenegrin : 

Out there, out there beyond the mountains ; 
My Czar has ceased to speak they say ; 
Of heroes was his speech that day. 

Out there, out there beyond the mountains ; 
In some dark cave beneath the hill 
They say my Czar is sleeping- still. 
He wakes ! and rising in our wrath 
We'll hurl the proud usurper forth : 
From Dechan church to Prisrend towers 
That olden heritage is ours ! 

Out there, out there beyond the mountains ; 
They say a verdant forest quakes. 
Where Dechan 's sainted race awakes ; 
A single prayer within that shrine, 
And Paradise is surely mine ! 

Out there, out there beyond the mountains; 
Where the blue sky to heavenlier light 
Is breaking — brothers ; to the fight ! 

Out there, out there beyond the mountains, 
Where tramps the foaming steed of war, 
132 





Albanian Peasant Woman. 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



Old Jugo calls his sons afar 
To aid ! to aid ! — in my old age 
Defend me from the foeman's rage ! 

Out there, out there beyond the mountains, 

My children, follow one and all, 

Where Nikola, your Prince, doth call. 

And steep anew in Turkish gore 

The sword Czar Dushan flashed of yore, 

Out there, out there beyond the mountains. 

There is no doubt that should the demise of 
the " Sick Man of Europe," or any other cause, 
tend to the rearrangement of that particular part 
of the map, Prince Nicholas and his highland war- 
riors are sure to benefit by it, and these long-ex- 
iled people may come down from the mountains 
and take possession once again of the rich val- 
leys from which they were driven by the conquer- 
ing hosts of Islam. 

Before leaving Cettinje I managed to secure 
two small kodaks, which represented the little 
capital so comprehensively as to allow no single 
feature to escape. The first was taken from the 
door of the inn on the occasion of the laying of 
the corner-stone for the new konak of the Crown 
Prince. In it appear the Prince and Princess, 
the Crown Prince, the Archbishop or Metropoli- 
tan, and the clergy ; the army, the citizens, the 
principal street, the public buildings, and the 
mountains in the background, all within a space 

135 



The Edge of the Orient 



of three by four inches. The other shows the 
whole extent of the valley, with the little capital 
in the centre, and makes a brave show of the 
public gardens in the foreground, the gardens 
consisting of an elaborate design of curved walks 
scratched on the white soil through the light, 
heathery growth which covers it. 

The little principality well repays a visit. It 
has no railroad, no bank, no currency nor coinage 
of its own, and but one die for all its postage 
stamps, but it has as brave a history as ever a 
nation cherished ; and it is worth while, in these 
days of commercial and political ascendancy, to 
go a long w T ay to see a little kingdom founded 
upon physical courage, whose very existence for 
nearly five hundred years has depended entirely 
upon its proved valor. 

No more fitting final w T ord can be said for these 
gallant mountaineers than the tribute paid them 
by Tennyson. 

" They rose to where their sovran eagle sails,. 
They kept their faith, their freedom on the height, 
Chaste, frugal, savage, arm'd by day and night 
Against the Turk ; whose inroad nowhere scales 
Their headlong passes, but his footstep fails, 
And red with blood the Crescent reels from fight 
Before their dauntless hundreds, in prone flight 
By thousands down the crags and thro' the vales. 
O smallest among peoples ! rough rock-throne 
i 3 6 



Cattaro and Montenegro 



Of Freedom ! warriors beating back the swarm 
Of Turkish Islam for rive hundred years, 
Great Tsernagora ! never since thine own 
Black ridges drew the cloud and brake the storm 
Has breathed a race of mightier mountaineers." 



139 



VI 

CONSTANTINOPLE 

I remember when a boy at school the map of 
Turkey used to be a great favorite for draw- 
ing on the blackboard from memory, because of 
the fancied resemblance borne by its outline to 
a bristling turkey-cock strutting proudly about, 
with wings distended and feathers ruffled, as 
though bidding defiance to all of the rest of the 
map of Europe. Since that time, however, its 
plumage has been so rumpled and plucked by the 
European powers that it has entirely lost its arro- 
gant appearance and no longer bears the slightest 
resemblance to the proud bird which graces the 
table of every good New Englander on Thanks- 
giving Day. The changes in its old capital, how- 
ever, have not been so marked ; and the great 
walls, stretching from the Sea of Marmora to the 
Golden Horn, constructed by Theodosius nearly 
fifteen hundred years ago, still mark the western 
limit of the ancient city. 

On these walls, in 1453, fell Constantine, the last 

of the Eastern emperors, fighting valiantly against 

140 



Constantinople 



odds of fifty to one, and crying piteously as he died, 
deserted by his flying troops, " Is there no Chris- 




Ancient Columns in Saint Sopnia. 

tian who will cut off my head?" Then throuo-h 
the great breaches in the walls rode " The Con- 

143 



The Edge of the Orient 



queror," Mohammed II., at the head of the Mos- 
lem hosts, slaying as he went, until he rode into 
the nave of St. Sophia and let loose his savage sol- 
diery upon the poor fugitives — priests and wom- 
en who had sought shelter there. On one of the 
pillars in the south bay of the great sanctuary, 
far beyond reach from the pavement, is pointed 
out to-day the mark of the Conqueror's bloody 
hand where, riding high upon the dead bodies of 
the slain, he smote the marble column, crying, 
" There is no God but God, and Mohammed is 
his Prophet," and close by another huge column 
bears a great gash, said to have been made by the 
stroke of his sword when he marked the Chris- 
tian church for his own. 

In strange contrast to this fierce conqueror is 
the present Sultan, Abdul Hamed IT, the well- 
meaning, but faint-hearted and weak, monarch, 
who lives concealed from his people in a state of 
almost perpetual personal terror in the small Yil- 
diz Kiosk, or Star Palace, about three miles from 
Pera, and separated by the Golden Horn and 
the entire European quarter from the great Mo- 
hammedan quarter of Stamboul, where the prin- 
cipal mosques, the bazaars, and the public offices 
of government are situated. 

At one time it was urged that the presence of 
the Padischa in Stamboul was obligatory during 
Ramadan, but as Abdul Hamed is not only an 



144 



Constantinople 



autocrat, but the head of his religion, he has 
abandoned the ceremony of the Selamlik in St. 
Sophia, and holds it at a little mosque built within 
a stone's throw of his palace at Yildiz, so that he 
may have all the way from the steps of his palace 
to the door of his mosque lined rank on rank deep 
with troops of cavalry and regiments of his house- 
hold guards. 

At the feast of Beiram it was customary with 
former Sultans to observe the ceremony of the 
Selamlik on a much grander scale than on ordi- 
nary occasions. The great imperial white and 
gold ka'ik, one hundred feet long, manned by 
twenty-six picked oarsmen, with the Sultan re- 
clining under a golden canopy at the stern, flew 
through the water at the head of a flotilla of 
gorgeously decorated boats, in which followed 
the members of his suite and the pachas. Salutes 
were fired from ships and batteries, and then the 
procession drew up at the old Seraglio Point, 
where horses and gorgeous equipages, escorted 
by troops of cavalry, were waiting to convey the 
" Defender of the Faith " to prayers ; but Abdul 
Hamed is a nervous man, and does not mean to 
expose himself to the possible attacks of con- 
spirators or bombs of anarchists, and so for years 
he has not left his own palace grounds except 
to traverse the distance of a few hundred yards 
which separates the Yildiz Palace from the 

145 



The Edge of the Orient 



mosque of the Hamidieh, when he goes to his 
prayers, guarded by five thousand picked horse- 
men and troops of the household guards. Not 
even on the occasion of the German Emperor's 
visit to him some years ago did the Sultan dare 
to move from the circumscribed space to which 
his fears for his personal safety have condemned 
him. The Selamlik of to-day, however, is an 
interesting spectacle, if only to show what elabo- 
rate precautions can be taken for the personal 
safety of the Moslem ruler. To view this cere- 
mony, the visitor must obtain a card from his 
legation or embassy, which will admit him to the 
guard-house opposite the mosque, and near the 
gate of the Sultan's palace grounds. Here he is 
ushered into a long, narrow room, with windows 
overlooking the entrance to the mosque and the 
square around which the troops are beginning to 
form, and after being warned not to lean out of 
the windows and not to use opera-glasses, he is 
permitted to view the green-turbaned regiments 
of Bashibazouks, the Nubian Blacks, and Albanian 
Whites, and the magnificently mounted squadrons 
of lancers and cavalry. When all the troops have 
been formed in place, watering-carts appear and 
sprinkle the road, and then come men in carts 
with fine gravel, which is carefully distributed 
along the route, so that there shall be no risk of his 

Majesty's horses losing their footing. Then nu- 

146 



. 







mm o 



; | 



J 



Constantinople 



merous household servants and eunuchs, bearing 
the Sultan's prayer-rug and Koran, and various 
accessories for making his prayers, saunter down 
the roadway and enter the mosque. Then come 
broughams full of veiled ladies from the harem, 
guarded by the chief eunuch, who are driven into 
the enclosure about the mosque, where the horses 
are taken from their traps, and they are left boxed 
up in their broughams to listen to the music of 
the bands, and to get such a limited view of the 
proceedings as they may from behind the drawn 
blinds of their carriages. 

Then comes a long pause, during which all eyes 
are directed toward the gate through which the 
Sultan is to appear, and presently an open carriage 
approaches, in which is seated a little man in a 
black coat, with a straight collar, without orna- 
ments or orders, or any distinctive signs of rank 
or royalty, and wearing an ordinary red fez ; and 
then the body-guards and the Turkish troops 
to a man burst into a shout like the explosion of 
musketry, crying, " Padischahim tchok yacha!" 
which means " Long live my Sultan ; " and the 
sorrowful -looking little sovereign, with the pale 
face, thin dark beard, and a hunted look in his 
dark, sunken eyes — a remarkable contrast to 
the strong face of Osman Pacha, the hero of 
Plevna, who sits opposite him — drives on and 

enters the mosque. After him come six beauti- 

149 



The Edge of the Orient 



fully caparisoned horses with gold -embroidered 
saddle-cloths, led by gorgeously attired grooms, 
then a small empty landau for his return trip, and 
then the imperial princes and other high digni- 
taries ; and when all have entered the mosque 
the shrill cry of the muezzin, who has been calling 
his " Allahu Akbar," and the calls to prayers 
from the minaret, ceases, and for about half an 
hour the Sultan remains at prayer, while the vis- 
itors in the guard-house are regaled with coffee 
and cigarettes as the guests of his Majesty. 

When he comes out from the mosque he steps 
into a small open landau, drawn by a pair of horses, 
and, taking the reins in his own hands, drives 
quickly back through the gate to the palace, the 
grooms following with the led horses. Then 
the horses are again hitched to the broughams 
in the yard, and the ladies of the household are 
trundled back to the harem after their exciting 
morning, and the pale little princes, in patent- 
leather riding boots and tight -fitting uniforms, 
follow along on their beautiful Arab steeds ; and 
when all are safely in the palace grounds and the 
great gates are closed the troops march away, 
with bands playing and banners filing, and the 
visitor is allowed to emerge from the guard-house. 

It seems incredible that the ruler of a great 
nation should be content to live in such seclusion, 
and through his personal cowardice voluntarily 

15° 



Constantinople 



deprive himself of all knowledge of his people 
and his State, save such as he can gain within the 
walls of his palace from his ministers and ad- 
visers. I have been told bv a Turk, who has 
access to the Sultan and knows him well, that he 
has often seen his Majesty upon the streets of the 
city disguised by a false gray beard and followed 
by one or two faithful attendants, endeavoring to 
discover for himself the real condition of his cap- 
ital and his people in the manner of Haroun al 
Raschid, the Caliph of Bagdad ; but I doubt if this 
be anything more than a kindly fable devised by 
a loyal subject to relieve his ruler from the con- 
tumacy attaching to his timorous behavior. 

Near the Yildiz Kiosk, and connected with it 
by a bridge over the roadway, is the Palace of 
Cheragan, where Abdul Hamed's brother and 
predecessor, the deposed Sultan Murad V., is 
supposed to be confined, and where Sultan Ab- 
dul Aziz, the uncle of Murad and Abdul Hamed, 
died by his own hand a few days after his deposi- 
tion by his nephew. 

There exists at present good and sufficient rea- 
son for the Sultan's uneasiness. Revolutionary 
pamphlets have been found in the mosques of 
Stamboul, and there are signs of rising Moham- 
medan discontent, which at any time may break 
out and release all Islam from the thraldom and 
taxation to which it is now subject under the 

*53 



The Edge of the Orient 

reign of the Osmanli. Considerably less than one- 
half of the nine hundred thousand inhabitants of 




A Turkish Beggar. 



the city are Moslems, and the Greeks and Arme- 
nians, of whom there are some three hundred 
thousand, would at once join in any insurrection 



154 



Constantinople 



for the overthrow of the present dynasty. The 
British squadron lies at the Island of Lemnos, 
near the entrance of the Dardanelles, and the 
Russian fleet is anchored near at hand, both pre- 
pared to enforce the demands of the European 
governments in regard to the administration in 
Armenia. These are the problems that the " Com- 
mander of the Faithful " has to contend with ; and 
unless he undertakes some radical change in his 
administration, it is hardly possible that the Otto- 
man rule in Europe will survive much longer, 
for the imperial system is drawing the life-blood 
from his subjects with its heavy burden of taxes. 
The contrasts in Constantinople between the royal 
palaces and kiosks and the poverty and squalor 
of the subjects who support them is distressing, 
and a visit to the Sultan's treasure-chamber in the 
old Seraglio, where golden thrones, great emeralds 
and rubies of fabulous value, wonderful stores of 
pearls and gems, and heaps of precious stones lie 
scattered about in the. greatest confusion and neg- 
lect in dusty drawers and rickety old cabinets 
with cobwebbed windows, only serves to empha- 
size the poverty of the wretched streets and the 
condition of the poor people who are so griev- 
ously taxed to support the master of this Oriental 
treasure-house. 

Although the Sultan may not go to Stamboul, 
the tourist does, for there is little to interest him 

155 



The Edge of the Orient 



in the European quarter of Pera or the slums of 
Galata as compared with the wonderful old city, 
where all the treasured handiwork of the Orient 
is stored. There is St. Sophia and the old Serag- 
lio, the Hippodrome and the Delphic Oracle, the 
Museum and the Bab-i-Ali, or Sublime Porte— a 
building- containing the offices of the Prime Min- 
ister, the Foreign Minister, and the Minister of 
the Interior. There is the Seraskerat, or War 
Office, with its great white marble tower, and 
there, above all, is the Great Bazaar, that ever- 
fascinating place, where the tourist returns again 
and again to bargain with Greek or Jew, Turk 
or Armenian, for some coveted bit of Eastern 
workmanship which has caught his fancy. The 
Great Bazaar is a veritable fortress in itself, en- 
closed by great stone walls and containing a per- 
fect labyrinth of streets, vaulted over with stone 
and lighted by innumerable small domes, which 
shed a dim light throughout the whole interior, 
which is crowded with little shops brilliant with 
silks from Damascus, gorgeous hangings from 
Persia, and multi-colored stuffs from Eastern 
looms. In the centre is another stronghold of 
walls within walls, the Bezestan, where the gold- 
smiths and silversmiths, jewellers and dealers in 
antiques, porcelains, curiosities, rare arms, silken 
rugs, and Persian carpets have their stalls. 

Outside the bazaars there are many attractive 

i 5 6 



Constantinople 

shops ; one in particular, to which every Ameri- 
can traveller finds his way, is that where the fa- 
mous Far-Away-Moses, immortalized by Mark 
Twain, presides. It is on the Tarakdjilar Han, 




Far-away-Moses at Home. 



which, as Mr. Dan. Daly would say " Is a street ; 
I don't know the name of it;" and there, if you 
have the good fortune to know Moses, you may 
sit for hours while his clerks display his wonder- 
ful wares for your delectation, and should you be 



J 57 



The Edge of the Orient 



there near the hour of noon, Moses may take you 
to a wonderful Indian room in his establishment, 
fitted with dark teak-wood and embroidered hang- 
ings, where he will have you served with a genu- 
ine Turkish repast, consisting of a pilaf of rice, 
kebabs, or small squares of mutton roasted on 
skewers, and mohalebi, a kind of blanc-mange. 
Then, after tiny cups of fragrant Turkish coffee, 
he may, as an especial favor, bring forth from their 
place of safe-keeping in the great fire-proof vaults 
in the cellar his greatest treasures, some magnifi- 
cent rugs, valued at from five to ten thousand 
dollars each, woven in pure silk of wonderful de- 
sign and most harmonious coloring, and unfold 
them before your enraptured eyes. 

An hour before sunset the bazaars close and the 
iron doors are locked and guarded by watchmen, 
and the stranger within the gates of Stamboul 
must find his way back to the Galata Bridge ; for 
the old city, which welcomes him by day, shuns 
him at night, and so he joins that wonderful stream 
of picturesque humanity which pours over the 
great bridge, second only to London Bridge in 
all the world for its traffic, and climbs the hill of 
Pera, past the tumble-down graveyard and the 
municipal gardens, to his hotel. 

Even Europeanized Pera has little to offer in 
the way of amusement after dark. On the Grand 
Rue de Pera there are several German beer-halls, 

i=;8 



Constantinople 



one of which has a carload of beer three times 
each week sent direct from Munich, and there are 
several so-called theatres, which usually mask 




The Galata Bridge. 
159 



The Edge of the Orient 



notoriously crooked roulette wheels. One of the 
leading places of this description is the Theatre 
Concordia, in which the greater part of the audi- 
ence seems to assemble in the easily accessible 
green-room, where the ladies who sing chanson- 
ettes are waiting their turns. Bej^ond the green- 
room is a dressing-room, hung with costumes, 
where a mysterious panel in the wall slides back 
and admits you to a room where red-fezzed Turks 
and foreigners of every nationality tempt the 
Goddess of Fortune at a wheel so delicately con- 
stituted that you may see it shiver with delight 
when a gold piece is placed on the red, and al- 
most lose its equilibrium in its haste to deposit 
the little ball safely in a black or double-zero com- 
partment. So, with only these questionable pleas- 
ures to choose from, the stranger as a rule keeps 
to his hotel in the evening, and if he has been 
under the care of an energetic dragoman, he is 
generally content to do so, as the steep hills of 
Pera and the noisy, ill-paved streets of the old 
city make a day's sight-seeing a tiresome task. 

How much longer this ancient capital, with its 
wonderful vitality and its heterogeneous popula- 
tion, composed of almost every nationality in the 
world, the key of Europe and the bone of conten- 
tion of the European powers, can remain under 
the Ottoman rule is one of the questions of the 
day. The Turks have a proverb, " Rather the 



1 60 



Constantinople 



gallows than exile ; " and although the boats 
of the Sultan's navy, which lie rotting in the 
Golden Horn, are little better than a lot of old 
coal barges, there is no doubt that the Turk will 
fight desperately and well to retain his European 
possessions if put to the test, but a struggle against 
the combined powers of Europe could only end 
in one way, and then, sorrowfully and reluctantly, 
as the Moors left Granada, would the Turk aban- 
don the ancient capital which he wrested from 
the Christians nearly five hundred years ago and 
has guarded so zealously ever since, and take his 
way to some new capital in Asia Minor, thus 
withdrawing the last stronghold of Mohamme- 
dan rule from Europe. 



161 



VII 
THE SWEET WATERS OF EUROPE 

From the top windows of the Hotel Bristol, in 
Pera, which overlook the municipal gardens, 
a wonderful panorama is extended before you. 
On your left is gray Stamboul, with the tower of 
the old Seraglio and the rounded dome and slen- 
der minarets of the Agia~ Sophia sharply outlined 
against the blue waters of Marmora and the pur- 
ple Islands of the Princes in the background. As 
your eye follows the line of mosques, minarets, 
fantastic houses and broken walls on the curve of 
the Golden Horn toward Eyoub, the sacred city, 
the background changes to low, rolling hills, at 
the base of which the dark cypresses of the Turk- 
ish cemeteries make a sombre shadow. Farther 
on, at the very tip of the Horn, where it is fed by 
the waters of the Kiat Khaneh, or paper-mill river, 
you may catch a glimpse of a cool, shaded valley 
surrounded by fresh green fields of clover and 
the verdant slopes of the low hills. 

" Truly I know of no fairer or sweeter resting- 
place in life's journey than the Valley of the Sweet 

162 




A Bend in the River. 



The Sweet Waters of Europe 



Waters above the Golden Horn," writes a travel- 
ler who has journeyed to many pleasant places, 
and this fair recommendation makes the Sweet 
Waters of Europe one of the objective points of 
every tourist fortunate enough to be in Constan- 
tinople during the warm spring days, when this 
resort is the most frequented. 

To be in the fashion you should drive out there 
in a smart trap and join the fashionable cavalcade 
which moves slowly along the wide shaded road at 
the side of the river as solemnly and as seriously 
as the long lines of stolid English men and women 
who are exhibited by their coachmen each after- 
noon during the season in Hyde Park for the 
amusement and delectation of the humble pedes- 
trian. However, the very fact that you can do 
this in Rotten Row, or the Bois de Boulogne, or 
the Prater, or Central Park may decide you to 
try a more novel method of conveyance. Then 
you may make the acquaintance of a Turkish kai'k. 

Entering the mouth of a tunnel, a few minutes' 
walk from the hotel, for one piastre you are 
quickly slid down the hill to Galata, and, making 
your w T ay to the boat station near the end of the 
famous Galata Bridge, you will find an assort- 
ment of ka'iks awaiting, and you may commence 
your bargain for the trip, as this is not a country 
of fixed prices, and you must bargain before you 
buy or you will be imposed upon. 

*6 5 



The Edge of the Orient 



The Turkish kaik is the lightest, swiftest, 
strongest, most comfortable, and most beautiful 
boat in the world, and you first attain the knowl- 
edge of perfect motion on the water when you 
lean back on the comfortable cushions and your 
white-clad kai'kjis bend their backs to the light 
and beautifully balanced oars. These oars have 
long, slender blades, cut in the shape of a crescent 
at the ends, while great rounded bulbs just below 
the handles balance the weight of the blades. 
There are no oar-locks, the oar being passed 
through a thong of rawhide which is fastened to 
a single pin driven in the gunwale, and a liberal 
application of tallow at the point of contact ren- 
ders the stroke absolutely noiseless and without a 
jerk at the beginning or end, as the oar slides eas- 
ily through the thong. 

Comfortably settled among the cushions at the 
bottom of the boat, you glide along through a 
busy throng of puffing little steamers and innu- 
merable small craft, past the inner bridge and the 
great useless hulks which constitute the Turkish 
navy, some of which are being reconstructed and 
modernized, most of them, however, being inca- 
pable of leaving their anchorages. 

After passing the limits of old Stamboul, on 
your left you see the vast cemetery and the 
sacred mosque of Eyoub, which marks the spot 
where thirty thousand Arabs fell outside the walls 

166 



The Sweet Waters of Europe 



of the old city in the first siege. None but Mos- 
lems are allowed within this mosque, and the 
sword of the Prophet, with which the Sultan is 
invested on his accession to the throne, is kept 
here. 

Now the stream narrows and turns toward 
the north, and you see before you green fields 
flanked by the distant hills, while around you the 
water is enlivened by numerous ka'iks filled with 
Turkish women carrying bright-colored parasols 
and attired in the most brilliant ferejeh, purple, 
red, blue, pink, yellow — in short, every shade and 
gradation of color known to the Oriental dye- 
maker — presenting a perfect kaleidoscope of 
changing color ; for this is Friday afternoon, the 
Moslem Sunday, and all the world is out, hurry- 
ing to the Sweet Waters, where they can see and 
be seen. 

As you go on the water constantly narrows 

and broadens again ; now, where the banks are 

close together and confined by masonry, you pass 

between rows of Turkish women squatting along 

the banks, with their yashmaks carefully drawn 

over their faces, but apparently indifferent to a 

considerable display of ankle ; then you shoot out 

into a broad lagoon and engage in the universal 

race to be first at the next of the narrow places 

spanned by wooden bridges. Navigation ends 

shortly before you come to the Imperial Kiosk, 

167 



The Edge of the Orient 



of white marble, beside which you can see, gleam- 
ing- through the trees, the single minaret and 
dome of a small mosque. On the shore, lining 




Turkish Woman wearing the Yashmak or Veil. 



the banks of the stream for half a mile or more, 
are gay pavilions, arbors, and tents, while moving 
about among the crowd are pedlers of ices and 
fruits — Turkish delight — queer tasteless wafers, 



The Sweet Waters of Europe 



and roasted pistache nuts. As you stroll along 
under the trees by the booths of the lemonade and 
coffee sellers you encounter picturesque groups 




The Sultan's Kiosk. 



squatted in the shade and plying their various 
trades. Dark-skinned gypsy women, clad in 
blue and white, with flowers in their hair, are 
singing, weaving romantic tales, or telling for- 
tunes for curious pleasure- seekers. Turkish 

169 



The Edge of the Orient 



musicians pound industriously on little tom- 
toms and blow monotonously on pipes of reed 
or draw plaintive notes from cracked violins. 
Two old, turbaned Arabs are doing the familiar 
juggling trick of the three metal cones and the 
disappearing corks, meanwhile jabbering away 

in a queer monotone to attract 
attention to their skill. 

A snake charmer evokes a 
weird sound from the long pipe 
w which he holds to his lips, while 




Gypsy Women Singing. 
170 



The Sweet Waters of Europe 



a small hooded cobra raises his head in obedience 
to the call, and an assistant near by pulls a tangle 
of snakes from a bag by their tails to have them 




The Turkish Arsenal- 



ready for the next feat of the performer. Farther 
down, where the crowd is not so great, a party 
of young men, known as " Young Turkey," who 
affect European costume and manners, are danc- 
ing a quadrille with some Greek girls, and lor 



i 7 i 



The Edge of the Orient 



lack of instrumental music are singing a Turkish 
air as they dance. A little way back in the fields 
is a picturesque arsenal, with the red flags and 
crescents of the Ottoman Empire flying from its 




Under the Trees. 



towers, and close by is a government cavalry 
school, where you may see some beautiful Arab 
horses, and where every afternoon small boys 
and cadets are drilled under the direction of 
Turkish officers, who do not scruple to lay a 
smart stroke of their heavy riding-whips over 
the shoulders of inattentive pupils. Farther up, 
beyond the white marble kiosk of the Sultan, 
where brilliant peacocks strut about beneath the 

trees and white swans sail silently about the lake, 

172 



The Sweet Waters of Europe 



commences the promenade, which extends along 
the bank of the stream under an avenue of 
magnificent trees as far as Kiat Khaneh Keni, or 
paper-mill village. Here, on every Friday after- 
noon, come the wealthy and fashionable Turkish 
women in perfectly appointed closed carriages, 
with dusky drivers and black eunuchs on every 
box to drive and guard them. The division of 
the sexes is complete ; a wife must not be seen 
with her husband, a mother with her son, or a 
sister with her brother, but men and women must 
go in separate conveyances. Here it is that the 
Turk has one of the few opportunities of re- 
garding from afar the lady of his love. As the 
carriages wheel slowly by batteries of eyes are 
turned upon the fair occupants, who, denied the 
privileges of speaking in public, have learned to 
use their eyes so effectively as to render speech 
entirely superfluous for purposes of flirtation. 
Of course, these beauties of the harems are veiled, 
but so artfully do they contrive the gossamer 
coverings for their faces that the transparent 
gauze enhances rather than conceals their charms, 
and in the instances where complexion and 
coloring is a work of art and not of nature the 
softening influence of the veil imparts an ap- 
pearance of bewildering and bewitching beauty 
which possibly does not exist. For two hours 
or more the promenaders move slowly up and 

173 



The Edge of the Orient 



down, those on foot pressing up near the road- 
way or loitering under the trees, where they 




Araba or Turkish Wagon. 



can command the best view of the occupants of 
the carriages, the most inquisitive sometimes 
incurring a frown from the black lala on the box ; 

174 



The Sweet Waters of Europe 



while on the farther side of the road the women 
of the humbler classes squat like toads along the 
low wall of masonry and enviously view their 
wealthier sisters. Farther up, on a hill overlook- 
ing the promenade, you may see one or two gen- 
uine Turkish arabas or wagons of carved and 
gilded wood, drawn by teams of bullocks, having 
arches hung with various-sized bells over their 
shoulders, and freighted with Turkish women 
from the country, who have come to see the more 
fashionable but less picturesque equipages of 
their city cousins. 

Toward sunset, when the carriages are hurrying 
back to the city, you make your way back toward 
the landing-place, stopping long enough for a cup 
of the fragrant coffee which is bubbling over a 
charcoal brazier beneath an arbor. Then when 
you have found your kaik and your stalwart kaik- 
jis have laid aside their short blue jackets em- 
broidered with silver crescents, you may light a 
Turkish cigarette and dispose yourself comfort- 
ably among the cushions at the bottom of the 
boat and glide swiftly along with the home-bound 
kaiks filled with laughing people and rivalling the 
sunset in their brilliant coloring. 

Nowhere in the world is there a more entranc- 
ing sight, and you will float home with a picture 
in your mind of dark eyes and shy glances, of red 
lips and sweet voices, of veils and yashmaks, of 

175 



The Edge of the Orient 



rainbow colors of satins and silks, of marble pal- 
aces and slender minarets, of cool waters and 
green fields, of quaint music and soft laughter, 
that you will remember all your days and that 
will renew your faith in the stories of the "Ara- 
bian Nights." 

" Blessed shall he be who shall take Constanti- 
nople," said the Prophet. More blessed is he, 
you may echo, who in these peaceful times may 
glide along the Sweet Waters of Europe, seeing 
on either side the bronzed and frank-faced Turks 
enjoying their simple amusements or smoking 
their peaceful narghilis in dreamy content, watch- 
ing the setting sun as it throws a rosy light over 
the dancing waters of the Golden Horn and tips 
the slender minarets with flame, and as the color 
fades from the water you may catch the faint 
echo of the muezzin's call to prayer, and dusky 
figures along the shore turn toward Mecca and 
prostrate themselves, thanking Allah that they 
are one day nearer to the groves and cool waters 
and everlasting gardens that the Prophet has 
promised for the faithful. 



176 



VIII 
SMYRNA AND SALONICA 

Smyrna, the great commercial centre of Asia 
Minor, is one of the oldest ports of the world. 
The steamers that call there turn from the 
^Egean Sea into the broad Gulf of Smyrna, and 
churn slowly along toward the south until they 
reach an old red light-ship, which marks a turn 
where the gulf narrows ; then, passing between 
some indifferent fortifications on either side until 
they come to where, circling the end of the gulf, 
are seen the white domes and slender minarets of 
one of the most ancient cities in existence. Ris- 
ing behind the city is a semicircle of dark cy- 
press-covered hills, throwing the white houses 
and rounded domes into sharp relief, while along 
the shore stretches a great stone quay, curving 
gracefully along the entire water-front in a way 
somewhat reminiscent of Naples. 

Smyrna shows surprisingly few traces of antiq- 
uity. On the hills high above the town tower 
the ruins of an old Roman citadel and the re- 
mains of a great wall, but in the city itself there 

177 



The Edge of the Orient 



is little or nothing in the way of architecture or 
even fragments which would suggest that the 
city was not entirely modern and common-place. 
Of the two hundred thousand inhabitants there 
are more Greeks than Turks, while about fifteen 




Approaching Smyrna. 



thousand are Levantines — a mixture of European, 
Greek, and Jewish blood, which produces the 
most beautiful women in the East. There are 
European hotels along the quays, where every 

one speaks English, and Turkish bazaars in the 

178 



Smyrna and Salonica 



narrow streets back from the water, where every 
one speaks Turkish. The bazaars are not as in- 
teresting as in most Oriental cities, as Smyrna 
does not produce or manufacture anything, but is 
simply a port of outlet for the produce and mer- 
chandise of other places, and most of the things 
that are shown in the dingy little shops on the 
dirty, narrow streets are seen in greater variety 
and to better advantage elsewhere. 

Modern European carriages are to be had for 
hire, and for a stipulated number of piastres you 
can be driven about the town in a rickety vehicle, 
over the worst-paved streets in the world, with 
the windows rattling and the whole equipage 
plunging about like a boat in a heavy sea, as the 
wheels slip down into great ravines or jump over 
the small bowlders with which the streets are 
paved. The street scenes are the most interest- 
ing feature of the city. Venders of figs, raisins, 
and Turkish paste cry their wares in the narrow 
alleys, and butchers go from house to house, 
where the handsome, dark-eyed Levantine women 
loiter in the doorways, and halt their peripatetic 
meat-shops, which consist of small donkeys, 
whose heads and tails barely show at either end 
of great boards in the shape of an inverted V 
which are strapped upon their backs, and upon 
either side of which is hung the dealer's entire 

stock in trade of spring lamb, shoulders of mut- 

179 



The Edge of the Orient 



ton, and roasts of beef, enabling the housekeeper 
to select any cut she may wish at her door. Tur- 
baned Mohammedans from the country lead 
grave, patient, and dignified-looking Asiatic 
camels, laden with figs and spices, through the 
streets to the warehouses, the vicinity of which 
can be detected by a pungent odor, which recalls 
to your mind the fact that Smyrna is the centre 
of the drug trade of the world ; and wherever the 
eye turns it meets some unfamiliar spectacle or 
bit of barbaric color to remind you that you are 
in the Orient. 

Probably every one who went to the Chicago 




Upper Harbor, Smyrna. 



Fair remembers Alfred Melloni, the Great Zei- 
beck, who strutted about the Turkish village in 
a wonderful costume, consisting principally of a 



Smyrna and Salonica 



remarkable collection of yatagans and silver- 
handled pistols and curved scimitars, which 
covered his entire front, and gave him the appear- 




Houses in the Turkish Quarter. 

ance of a walking arsenal, an effect which was 
somewhat softened, however, by the display of his 
pudgy bare knees below. Alfred has given up 
this martial raiment with which he dazzled the 
unsophisticated inhabitants of the Western hemi- 
sphere, and arrayed in a frock-coat and a square- 
topped brown Derby, with his nether limbs 
encased in the less spectacular trousers of civiliza- 
tion, he boards each incoming steamer and offers 
his services as a guide to Smyrna and Ephesus. 

The best view of Smyrna is to be had from 
the old Roman citadel at the crest of Mount 
Pagus, a steep hill behind the town. Driving 
out past the great Mohammedan cemetery, 
where turbaned head -stones lean in all direc- 



The Edge of the Orient 



tions, or lie prostrate under the cypress-trees, 
you pass little coffee -shops and cafes, where 
drowsy Turks sit placidly drawing on their 
narghilis, until you come to the foot of a hill, 
so steep that the carriage can go no farther. 
Here you mount sure-footed little donkeys, 
which toil patiently up the sharp ascent, till you 
stand upon the ruined walls, which overlook the 
whole city and harbor, and enjoy a view well 
worth the trouble of the climb, although your 
enjoyment of the 
jaunt may be some- 
what abated on the 
return trip, when 
your donkey consti- 
tutes himself into an 
animate toboggan 
and slides most of 




Turkish Graveyard and Mosque. 
182 




Q- 



Smyrna and Salonica 



the way down the hill in an alarmingly reckless 
fashion. 

An hour and a quarter from Smyrna by ex- 
press train on the Aidin Railway is the little 




The Cave of the Seven Sleepers. 



village of Ayasalouk, the station for Ephesus, a 
pleasant ride in a most comfortable modern rail- 
way carriage, over a route leading through fer- 
tile fields and pastures, where many flocks of 
sheep and herds of goats are tended by pictur- 
esque shepherds in long robes. Near the station 

185 



The Edge of the Orient 



passes the line of a great Roman aqueduct which 
carried water from the mountains across the 
plains to Ephesus. Many of the arches are de- 
stroyed, but a long line of columns remain, upon 




How Brigands are treated. 

which a great colony of storks have built their 
nests, and gravely stand upon one leg, on the 
tops of the high columns, in silent and motionless 
contemplation of the ruins of the great city, as 
though the souls of some of the ancient philoso- 
phers had entered their bodies, and returned to 
gaze in solemn meditation on the desolate scene 
of their earthly greatness, where once the great 
Temple of Diana, one of the seven wonders of the 
world, reared its proud walls. Here, in this val- 
ley, were the fabled haunts of Pan and Bacchus ; 
here Hercules wrought his wonderful deeds ; 
here were born Apollo and Diana; and here you 



Smyrna and Salonica 



may see to-day the Cave of the Seven Sleepers. 
Now, the great temple is little more than a hole 
in the ground, with broken slabs and columns of 
discolored marble, and here and there a frag- 
ment of a beautifully carved capital, lying about 
to testify to its former magnificence. 

In the mountains about Smyrna lurk a number 
of brigands, whose depredations have been ren- 
dered less frequent in late years, owing to the 
summary punishment dealt them by the Turkish 




A Warning to Malefactors. 



authorities, who do not stop to try them for 
their offences, but cut off their heads, and exhibit 
them to the public in the prison-yard at Smyrna, 
as a warning to all lawlessly inclined citizens, 



The Edge of the Orient 



or stick them high up on the points of the iron 
railing, as a caution to their fellows in the hills 
behind the town, whose keen eyes may easily dis- 
cern this ghastly exhibition of Turkish justice. 

The steamers that leave Smyrna carry a curi- 
ous lot of passengers on the forward deck, as 
it is the great port of embarkation for all the 
picturesque inhabitants of Asia Minor. Here, 
huddled together in picturesque groups, are 
Eastern merchants with bales of silks and rugs 
for the bazaars in Constantinople ; green and 
white-turbaned Moslems ; Egyptian officers and 
soldiers ; Ethiopian maids in feridjees of plum- 
colored silk ; negroes from the Soudan ; venders 
of lemonade, with huge glass bottles, or tankards 
of copper and brass strapped over their should- 
ers, and brass trays at their waists with four 
glasses and a place for money ; sellers of curious 
rolls, pastry and figs ; men in Turkish trousers ; 
and men in long silk robes ; Mohammedans at 
prayer; men in jackets of brocade gay with 
roses; all surrounded by bundles of bedding, 
multi-colored rugs, and gaily painted tin trunks, 
and all bound on their various errands to that 
wonderful city, the Turks' great European capi- 
tal, Constantinople. 

The steamers of the Messageries Maritimes, 
which call at all the important ports on the Med- 
iterranean from Marseilles to Beyrout, take from 

190 



Smyrna and Salonica 



eighteen to twent) T hours on the run from Smyrna 
to Salonica, which, after Constantinople, is the 
most important city of European Turkey. As 
you enter the beautiful harbor at the end of the 
great gulf, shut in on all sides by the shadowy 
forms of great mountains in the distance, the city 
rises before you, built tier upon tier on the slope 
of the hills, like a huge amphitheatre, with its 
boundaries defined by the line of an ancient wall 
which springs from the sides of a ruined citadel 
perched high on the hill behind, and makes its 
way gradually down to the water-front on either 
side of the old town. 

At one extremity of the great stone quay, 
which stretches along the entire water-front, is 
an old white battlemented tower, surrounded by 
strong walls, known as the Genoese Tower and 
called by the Turks Kauli-Kule, or Tower of 
Blood. Behind the quay the modern tramway, 
with busy cars running to and fro, does much to 
destroy the Eastern atmosphere of the place, 
forcing you to close your eyes to this feature of 
the foreground and look only at the tapering 
minarets of the mosques and the domes of the an- 
cient Christian churches beyond, before you can 
belieye that you are really in an Oriental port. 
To the student of ecclesiastical architecture these 
old churches, now conyerted into Mohammedan 

mosques, are most interesting. The old basilica 

191 



The Edge of the Orient 



of St. Demetrius, where the saint, who was mur- 
dered in his cell, is entombed, has some fine col- 
umns and wonderfully carved marble capitals, 
the beauty of which however has been destroyed 
by the Mohammedans, who have painted them a 
light terra-cotta color. In this church is also the 
tomb of the daughter of one of the Greek emper- 
ors, and a small round hole at the head of the 
great stone sarcophagus is pointed out, which, 
according to a grewsome tradition, was made by 
a serpent who crawled in and ate away her eyes. 
The mosque of St. George, another of the early 
Christian churches, which is probably over fif- 
teen hundred years old, contains some beautiful 
mosaics in the dome and chapel ceilings, which, 
have been ruthlessly and wretchedly restored by 
an Italian who has painted his name prominently 
in several places, and added the date 1889 to bear 
witness to his vulgar modern handiwork. 

Beyond the old churches there is little of inter- 
est in modern Thessalonica. There is a dilapi- 
dated arch of Constantine, and there is an old 
stone pulpit from which St. Paul is said to have 
preached, although there is every reason to sup- 
pose that it was not built until hundreds of years 
after his death. After having seen all these 
things, it will repay the incredulous traveller to 
climb the hill to the citadel above the town, and 

enjoy the grand view of the city and harbor, with 

192 




CD 



Smyrna and Salonica 



the snow-capped summit of grand old Mount Olym- 
pus, the throne of Jove and abiding-place of all 
the gods, looming up majestically in the distance ; 
or, if you wish to spend an hour or two in the 
bazaars, you may iind vour way to the queer 
little shop of Osman, the dealer in antiquities, 
in the " Tellal Tcharchoussi," and bargain with 
him for his rare bits of embroidery and quaint 
silver-handled pistols and cartridge-boxes. What- 
ever is choice and rare in his collection the 
shrewd old Turk will permit you to glance at for 
a moment, and then he will jealously cover it up 
and put it out of the way, as though nothing in 
the world would tempt him to sell it ; and should 
you ask to see it again he will shake his head 
and sav " too — much— money," as though he him- 
self were reluctant to name the exorbitant figure 
which alone would induce him to part with it ; 
and then the wily old merchant will proceed to 
show you all the cheap trash in his shop until 
you resolve that you must have the " too-much- 
money " articles at any price, and when once you 
begin to bargain for them on that basis, you mav 
be sure that it will not be Osman who will get 
the worst of the transaction, no matter what con- 
cessions he mav grant in the matter of price on 
the treasures of Oriental workmanship which you 
carry back to vour steamer with vou. 



195 



IX 

BEYROUT AND DAMASCUS 

AT twilight, one day in April, a rickety little 
four-wheeled yellow omnibus, drawn by a 
spike team of two horses and a mule, drew up in 
front of a cheery looking little stone inn at Shtora, 
and two hungry and weary travellers stretched 
their legs with a sigh of relief, and proceeded at 
once to ascertain the earliest possible moment at 
which they could be served with dinner. 

All the early part of the day w r e had been toil- 
ing slowly up the Lebanon Mountains, leaving 
behind us the vineyards and great plantations of 
fig, olive, pomegranate and mulberry trees in the 
beautiful valley behind Beyrout, where the apri- 
cots were in full bloom and scarlet poppies lined 
the roadside. As we wound upward on the tor- 
tuous road, Beyrout spread itself below us, a glit- 
tering little white city projecting into the Med- 
iterranean. From time to time we passed pictur- 
esque little stone villas, almost hidden in foliage, 
where some of the richer people of Beyrout find 

a cool resort for the hot summer months. Finally 

196 



Beyrout and Damascus 



we reach a turn in the road which brings us to 
where the mountain makes a sheer descent to the 
wild valley beneath, a great, cold, gray cloud en- 
velopes us, the picture below is obscured, and 
nothing can be seen but the shadowy form of an 
eagle wheeling silently above us in the chill, 
misty atmosphere. Then we pull our great coats 
about us and make our way through a foot of 
snow toward the descent on the other side of the 
mountain. As we emerge from the mist we hear 
a jangling of bells and see the lead mule of a 
small caravan corning slowly up the slope, with 
an American flag flying from a staff stuck in the 
pack - saddle ; behind follow other mules and 
rough little pack-horses laden with rugs, bundles 
of silks, Arab spears and curiously inlaid guns, 
the spoils of a tourist who rides behind with his 
dragoman. In front of us is Mount Hermon, 
streaked with white ravines where the snow lies 
thick, called by the Arabs, Jebel esh-Shekh, 
or mountain of the old man. As we approach 
Shtora the wonderful valley of the Lebanon opens 
out before us, as variegated and brilliant in color 
as an oriental embroidery or a Bokhara carpet ; 
beyond rises the long misty blue range of the 
anti-Lebanons, while below the fertile valley 
spreads before us like a map, with silver streams 
of water running through the freshly turned, red 

fields, irrigating the orchards of figs, olives, apri- 

199 



The Edge of the Orient 



cots and pomegranates, and the great vineyards 
which supply the famous Shtora wine. 

At dinner we had the company of a Caucasian 
engineer, Ibrahim Edhem, by name, employed in 
the construction of the new railroad which was 
being laid between Bevrout and Damascus, a 
picturesque figure in a long black coat tightly 
belted in at the waist, high Russian boots, and 
tall astrachan cap, with a bright steel military axe 
in his belt. 

We had finished dinner and were smoking 
our pipes in a cool balcony with pointed stone 
arches which overlooked the road, when a train 
of four large, wooden .covered wagons or cars, 
each drawn by a team of six well-built mules and 
escorted bv a company of Turkish soldiers, drew 
up in front of the inn and made preparation for 
their night's halt. It was the money-train sent 
each vear by the Sultan, from Constantinople to 
Mecca, and the wagons were loaded with silver 
coin to be distributed among the needy pilgrims 
who made the journey to the holv shrine. The 
mules were quicklv led awav to the stables, little 
fires were lighted near the baggage-wagons, and 
soon the whole party, with the exception of three 
or four of the soldiers who stood on guard, were 
en]oying a savory stew of rice and chopped meat. 
After dinner, one bv one thev climbed in turn to 
the flat roofs of the money-wagons, their dark 



Beyrout and Damascus 



figures silhouetted against the stables opposite, 
and, spreading their rugs and turning their faces 
in the direction of Mecca, silently performed the 
genuflections of Mohammedan prayer. This was 
our first glimpse of the great Syrian pilgrimage, 
which leaves Damascus each year in the month 
Shawwal, following the fast of Ramadan, and 
makes its way painfully, slowly, and laboriously 
over the more than nine hundred miles of desert 
which lie between Damascus and Mecca. 

The money-train departed the next morning at 
daylight, but the morning diligence brought more 
faithful Moslems who spread their rugs by the 
roadside and prayed, while the tired horses were 
being exchanged for fresh ones that would take 
them another stage on the way to Damascus. 

Leaving Shtora in the morning at daybreak for 
Baalbek, we drove up the beautiful valley of the 
Lebanons, gay with wild flowers and fresh spring 
verdure, and set in the midst of a great arena of 
unreal and unsubstantial looking blue mountains 
with white summits, which somehow gave the 
impression of being painted in on the background 
for a sort of theatrical, scenic effect. At a sharp 
turn in the road we came upon a gazelle which 
ran before us for a mile or more scarcely seem- 
ing to touch its feet to the ground as it went 
springing along. A few miles to the north of 
Shtora lies Kerak Nuh, where the tomb oi the 



The Edge of the Orient 



patriarch Noah is shown. The grave in which 
the ancient mariner lies is more than one hun- 
dred and thirty feet long, but even this extreme 




The Great Columns. Baalbek. 



longitude does not satisfy the Arab guides, who 
evidently believe that there were great men in 
those days, and maintain that if the patriarch had 



Beyrout and Damascus 



not been buried with his knees bent and his feet 
extending downwards, his grave would not have 
been less than one hundred and fifty feet in 
length. A five hours' drive brings us within sight 
of the ruins of Baalbek the Magnificent — the 




Illustrating the Diameter of a Fallen Column. 

"City of the Sun" and the " God of the Valley," 
where stands the massive masonry and wonder- 
fully beautiful columns of the most glorious ruin 
in the world. 

High above the ruins of the great temple six- 
huge columns raise their heads. The suns of 

203 



The Edge of the Orient 



man}- centuries have ripened them to a mellow 
golden color. Not in the whole world is there 
anything more beautiful than these gigantic pil- 
lars of stone springing from the plain grandly 
defying the ravages of time which has laid low 
fifty of their fellows that once stood beside them 
forming the peristyle of the great temple. 

In the enclosing wall, at a height of about 
twenty feet above the ground, are three gigan- 
tic blocks of stone — the largest ever used in 
building. They measure respectively 64 feet, 
63^ feet, and 62 feet in length, and are each 13 
feet high and 13 feet thick. This part of the 
structure is ascribed to the Phoenicians ; but 
when and how these great stones were put in 
place will probably always remain one of the 
great mysteries of the world. 

The Arabs have a tradition that it was built 
by Cain as a refuge from the wrath of Jehovah, 
and that after the flood, when Nimrod ruled over 
Lebanon, he sent giants to rebuild it. It is also 
referred to by Arab historians as the tower of Ba- 
bel and the Temple of Solomon. 

Whatever its origin, it stands to-day the most 
beautiful and impressive ruin in the world, so sat- 
isfying in its grandeur that even the traveller fresh 
from Egypt and the Pyramids looks with awe and 
amazement upon its cyclopean proportions. 

From Baalbek we drove back to Shtora, where 

204 




(3 



Beyrout and Damascus 



Ave resumed our journey to Damascus. On leav- 
ing Shtora after crossing the valley we climbed the 
steep slopes of the anti-Lebanons, and rode along 
for miles through a wild, rockv canon, finally de- 
scending rapidly toward the Wady Barada, the 
valley of that beautiful river, the Barada, or 
Abana, the joy and pride of the Syrians, which 
occupies in their affections to-day the same high 
place that it did of old when Naaman, the leper, 
cried to Elisha's messenger, " Are not Abana and 
Pharpar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the 
waters of Israel?" and, unless the character of 
the streams has greatly changed since that time, 
Elisha's messenger must have been constrained 
to answer in the affirmative as he looked on the 
fresh, sparkling stream of the Abana, shining 
amongst the luxurious vegetation of the beau- 
tiful valley, and compared it with the turbulent 
and muddy waters of the Jordan, rushing along 
on its way to the Dead Sea. 

As we approach Damascus the waters of the 
Barada are divided and led away through many 
channels, and numerous conduits at different 
levels convey the water to all parts of the city. 
On the left, at the back of the village Es-Salahi- 
yeh, rises the barren Jebel Kasiun, where Adam 
is supposed to have lived, and where, according 
to Arab tradition, the boclv of the murdered Abel 

was hidden in a cavern. 

207 



The Edge of the Orient 



Presently we pass an old mill on the right, and 
then the road leads for a long distance between 
pleasant gardens, where drowsy Arabs are con- 
tentedly smoking their narghilis in the shade of 
the citron and pomegranate trees near the banks 
of the rushing stream, and then a turn in the road 
reveals the distant minarets and the white-domed 
khans of Damascus gleaming in the sunlight. As 
we go on, we pass on our right the Merj, a large, 
open field on the banks of the Abana, where Arab, 
Bedouin, and Turkish riders are exhibiting their 
wonderful horsemanship in the game of throwing 
the djerid. Finally we pass the Tekkiyeh, an old 
dervish monastery, and draw up in front of a 
small hotel with stucco walls and a very uninvit- 
ing looking exterior, and our journey for the day 
is over. 

Toward the close of Ramadan, the month of 
fasting, Damascus begins to take on a holiday 
appearance, and the bazaars are crowded with 
strange people from the deserts, and pilgrims 
who have come to join the caravan which starts 
about a week after the three days' feast of Bei- 
ram is over. 

The principal bazaars are in the " Street called 

Straight," spoken of in the Bible, a long, covered 

roadway with an arched roof, leading from the 

citadel to the old city wall, near to the house of 

Ananias, and to the place where St. Paul is sup- 

208 



Be} rout and Damascus 



posed to have made his escape from Damascus. 
From this street narrow arteries lead in every 
direction, all peopled with picturesque humanity, 
from the Shekh in silk kaftan, to the beggar in 




Tomb of Saladin in Damascus. 



sackcloth, or the tattooed, unveiled Bedouin 
woman from the desert, all buying or begging 
something to make merry with in the coming 

three days' feast. Venders of merchandise of 

209 



i he Edge of the Orient 



every description are crying their wares in shrill 
voices. A man selling- cresses cries, " Eat of my 
cresses, oh ye old women, and become young 
again," while a flower-seller points to his bouquets 
and says, " salih hamatak," which means " appease 
your mother-in-law." Little cooking-shops ex- 
hale the savory odor of kebabs — little cubes of 
mutton and fat — which are being roasted on 
skewers over charcoal fires. Sellers of khushaf, a 
drink prepared from raisins, oranges, and apricots, 
and cooled with snow from the Lebanons, are 
vaunting the superiority of their especial bever- 
age, and calling attention to its coolness and 
clearness as it stands in the gigantic glass bottles. 
Tarboosh makers are ironing the red fezzes on 
brass moulds, and copper and brass workers are 
hammering away busily at their Avares. At the 
corner of a narrow alley sits a scribe, with quill 
in hand and ink-pot strapped about his waist, pre- 
pared to turn his hand to anything from a love- 
letter to a dragoman's contract ; while grav- 
bearded book-sellers sit gravel v in their stalls 
turning the leaves of old Korans or poring over 
curious volumes of Arabic tales. 

On the last day of Ramadan the street is filled 
with green boughs of every variety, which are 
eagerly bought bv the women, who go in great 
numbers to the cemeteries and deck the graves 
with them, it being customary at this season for 



Beyrout and Damascus 



the relatives of the dead to visit their graves and 
tombs, and to make their prayers for the souls of 
the departed. People of wealth erect gay-colored 
tents over the graves which they visit, to protect 




: m IP 



Tombs decorated during Feast of Beiram. 

themselves from the hot sun, refreshments are 
served, and the whole cemetery wears a gala look. 
The children come in for their share of the gen- 
eral festivities in Beiram, and, decked like their 
elders in the gayest of new gowns, they gorge 



The Edge of the Orient 



themselves with ices and sweets in the bazaars, 
drink sweetened and colored water from long- 
necked bottles, and ride about the street in queer 
little wagons bedecked with flags and streamers, 
pushed by good-natured Syrians. 

The gardens beside the Barada are rilled with 
pleasure-seekers, who eat ices and sweets, drink 
thick black coffee from tiny cups, and smoke their 
narghilis, while story-tellers squat before them 
on the ground, relating wonderful tales for their 
amusement. Rich merchants keep open house 
and vie with one another in the splendor of the 
entertainments given in the open courtyards of 
their marble palaces, and if you are fortunate 
enough to secure an invitation from one of them 
some night, you may sit on a luxurious divan in 
the liwan, a lofty, open colonnade with pointed 
arches, at the side of a marble-paved courtyard, 
where the moonlight sifts through the rich green 
foliage of the orange and citron trees, revealing 
the yellow gleam of the ripening fruit, and the 
air is fragrant with jasmine and apricot blossoms; 
and while you smoke your peaceful narghili and 
listen to the musical splash of the water in the 
great fountain, you may see Salha dance in the 
moonlit courtyard — Salha, the beautiful, tall Jew- 
ess with the oval face and olive skin, and the 
darkest hair and most brilliant eyes you have ever 
seen, who moves with a freedom and grace you 



Beyrout and Damascus 



have never before imagined, who is as straight 
and slender as an arrow and as proud as a prin- 
cess, and who dances like a demon when the fumes 
of the raki have gone to her brain. 






IM 



f? 
















The Burned Omayyade Mosque. 



The great Omayyade Mosque, in the building 
of which the genii are said to have assisted the 
twelve hundred artists who were summoned from 
Constantinople for the huge task, and for which 
antique columns and rarest marbles were brought 
from all the ancient temples of Syria, was burned 

215 



The Ed°e of the Orient 



in the autumn of 1893, but the courtyard is still 
intact, and during Ramadan and Beiram is 
thronged with devout Moslems who come in 
answer to the shrill cry of the muezzin, who, high 
up in one of the graceful minarets, repeats his 
" Allahu Akbar " — " Allah is great" — and testifies 
to the glory of Mohammed. The minaret at the 




11 



**—*■; 

„.•*» 




f Mj 



View of Damascus from the Garbtyeh Minaret of the Great Mosque. 

southeast corner bears the name of Madinet 'Isa, 
from the ancient tradition that, at the last judg- 
ment day, Jesus will take his place on its summit 
to judge the world. At the side of the mosque 
are the ruins of the goldsmith's bazaar, which, with 
its rich stores of curiously wrought silver and 
gold, was entirely destroyed by the fire which 
ruined the srreat Mohammedan temple. 

Eumer Ruschdi Pacha, the Mushir, or Turkish 

Military Governor of Damascus, holds a high 

216 



u . 




u 



Beyrout and Damascus 



levee at the end of Ramadan and later, when the 
pilgrims are ready to start to Mecca, he directs 
the ceremonies and sees the rich embroidered 
hangings for the Kaaba, together with a Koran 
and the Green Flag of the Prophet, carefully dis- 
posed in the .magnificently draped camel litter in 
which they are to be conveyed to Beit Allah (the 
house of God), the holy mosque at Mecca. 

When the pilgrims start they go out of the 
gate called Bawwabet Allah, or God's Gate, and 
the long procession of thousands of devout Mos- 
lems of all ranks moves slowly along the Meidan, 
a long street which leads through the suburbs 
of Damascus toward the route to Mecca. In 
front are the Turkish officers and the military 
band, then the richly caparisoned camel bearing 
the litter containing the embroidered cloths, and 
following after, thousands of pilgrims of all de- 
grees — old men and young men, beggars on foot 
and princes on horseback, all bound to the mother 
of cities on the one common errand which has 
been the duty of every faithful Mohammedan for 
thirteen hundred years. 

Bedouins from the desert, with their dark head- 
shawls held in place by thick coils of camel's- 
hair wound* twice round their heads, riding beau- 
tiful Arab horses guided only by a rope-halter ; 
Kurdish shepherds ; Arabs on dromedaries ; 

Druses of high rank, wearing snow-white turbans, 

219 



The Edge of the Orient 



and armed with 'long - lances, silver-handled pis- 
tols, curved swords and long-barrelled guns with 




Waiting for the Procession. 



richly ornamented stocks ; wild-looking men 
from the desert with unkempt locks and restless 
eyes ; and grotesque camel litters covered with 



Beyrout and Damascus 



colored cloths, carrying pilgrims too wealthy or 
too weak to walk. Many go out of the gate 
never to return, having put off their pilgrimage 
until old age or disease has so weakened them 
that they are unable to endure the hardships of 
the desert trip, but succumb on the way, happy, 




i 

The Women on 'the Housetops 




however, in the belief that he who dies on the 
pilgrimage is immediately transported to that 
Paradise where sparkling fountains flow in the 
midst of green gardens filled with golden fruit, 
and where beautiful houris, with eyes like sloes, 
wait upon the faithful. 

And so this great procession passes out of the 
city, watched by the women from the housetops 
until it becomes a mere cloud of dust in the des- 
ert, and when the setting sun halts them for the 



223 



The Edge of the Orient 



night, its last rays fall upon thousands of dark- 
robed figures with faces turned toward Mecca, 
bending their heads to the yellow sand, and 
thanking Allah that one day of their pilgrimage 
is accomplished, and that they are one day's 
march nearer to the sacred shrine. 



224 



X 

THE PACHA'S LEVEE 

ONE morning, after a night's rest broken many 
times by the howling and barking of the 
countless, snarling yellow curs which infest the 
streets of Damascus, I was awakened by the sound 
of a Turkish band marching down the dusty street 
by the side of the Barada. The weird and monot- 
onous droning of the clarinets grew louder as the 
procession neared the hotel, but as it was not yet 
seven o'clock and the pariah dogs had cheated 
me out of the best part of my night's sleep, I did 
not rise, preferring to lie comfortably in bed, 
where I could look out at the golden fruit which 
gleamed among the dark foliage of the orange- 
trees in the courtyard, and listen to the cool 
splash of the water as it fell into the marble basin 
of the fountain. 

The sound of passing feet died away, the music 
was growing faint in the distance, and I was doz- 
ing off comfortably into another little nap, when 
there was a rap on my door, and a fellow-trav- 
eller rushed in, exclaiming, excitedly : 

225 



The Edge of the Orient 



" Well, you have missed it ! This is the first 
day of the great Moslem feast of Beiram, and all 
the dignitaries of Syria, in splendid robes and silk 
kaftans, have just passed in procession on their 
way to pay their respects to the Mushir, the 
Turkish military governor, who is holding a 
grand levee this morning." 

Somewhat nettled at having missed this pictur- 
esque parade I arose, and, while my fellow-trav- 
eller was breakfasting, I made my way down the 
narrow street toward the citadel. I had not 
gone far when I was joined by the watchful Yo- 
sef, a Syrian dragoman, who had guided me 
through the intricacies of the bazaars on the pre- 
ceding day. 

" Yosef," I exclaimed, " what manner of drago- 
man are you, that you did not inform me yester- 
day of this spectacle ? " 

" Ah, Excellency," returned the crafty Yosef, 
who had evidently known no more of the celebra- 
tion than myself until he was awakened by the 
sound of the band, " I wished to make a surprise 
for you. At six o'clock this morning I wait for 
you by the hotel, but you not wake. Now you 
like Turkish band, we go hear him play in the 
serai." 

We made our way through the narrow twist- 
ing streets, stepping over the sleeping dogs which 
lay stretched out in the middle of the roads, ex- 



226 



The Pacha's Levee 



hausted by their night's prowling- and yelping, 
until we came to the military serai or square, on 
one side of which stretched the barracks of the 
Fifth Corps of the Turkish army, while opposite 
was the palace of the Mushir, the commandant 
and general of the division. 

The square presented a brilliant sight. In a 
small enclosed garden, at the right of the palace, 
the band was playing lustily, and two pyramids 
of bells of various sizes, arranged on staves, sur- 
mounted by golden crescents, dazzled the eyes as 
they were turned rapidly in the bright sunlight, 
keeping time with the barbaric music. 

To the left of the palace carriages were driving 
up with dark-faced coachmen in silk robes and 
red tarbooshes, and gorgeous cavasses in blue 
jackets richly embroidered with gold, wearing 
long curved swords with silver handles, and look- 
ing very fierce and important, on the box-seat. 
From the carriages a stream of grave-looking 
Syrian dignitaries in silks and satins were alight- 
ing at the foot of the marble steps. Black- 
bearded Greek priests and bishops in purple and 
black vestments, wearing tall black head-cover- 
ings bearing a strong resemblance to a modern 
silk hat worn upside down ; hadjis and descend- 
ants of the Prophet with green turbans ; dervish 
sheiks in long brown gowns, wearing on their 

heads great brown cones nearly two feet high, 

227 



The Edge of the Orient 



like inverted flower- pots; Turkish officers in 
smart uniforms ; Bedouins from the desert with 
their dark silk kaffiehs, held in place by thick coils 
of camel's-hair wrapped around their heads, were 
dismounting from their gaily caparisoned Arab 
horses, whose saddles and bridles were decorated 
with brilliant designs in beads and shells ; sheiks 
from Palmyra and Baalbek ; rulers of the small 
desert towns — all had come to pay their respects 
to the Mushir. 

I had stood for some time, elbowed by the 
crowd and noting each fresh arrival, before my 
curiosity led me to wonder what was going on 
inside the palace, and how the Mushir would re- 
ceive his guests ; but no sooner did the thought 
occur to me than I determined if possible to go 
in and see for myself ; so, turning to Yosef, I 
said : 

" Yosef, I will also pay my respects to the gov- 
ernor." 

" Oh," said Yosef, with visible signs of alarm in 
his usually imperturbable face, " it ees not neces- 
sairy." 

I explained that even if it were not necessary 
I intended to go, but Yosef demurred. 

" You do not know heem. You cannot go." 

I endeavored to explain to Yosef that possibly 
if I did know the Mushir I might not wish to go ; 
but, not having the pleasure of meeting him, I felt 



228 



The Pacha's Levee 



bound to give him the benefit of any doubt as to 
the desirability of his acquaintance, and pay him 
my respects. Yosef was in despair. 

" It could not be — it was not necessairy." He 
begged and implored, and threatened to desert 
me; but I had determined to see the inside of the 
palace, and his prayers did not move me. So, 
drawing on my gloves and squaring my shoulders 
I mustered up all the dignity at my command, 
and, marching over to a conspicuous Turkish 
official, literally smothered in gold lace, who was 
standing at the foot of the marble steps, pulled 
out my card-case and presented him with my card. 
He held it upside down and looked curiously at 
it, then turned it over and looked at the back to 
see if there should be anything there which he 
could decipher. The blank back afforded him no 
clew, and so, with an utterly puzzled look, he 
passed it on to another gold-laced guardian, who 
stood a few steps above him, accompanying the 
transfer with a remark in Turkish which ap- 
peared to me to be entirely irrelevant. Mean- 
while I stood calmly at the foot of the steps, 
while my card was passed from hand to hand, 
and finally disappeared through the doorway. 

A moment afterward two of the commandant's 
aides appeared at the top of the steps, a question 
was asked, and I was pointed out to them, and 

they saluted me gravely and escorted me to the 

229 



The Edge of the Orient 



top of the marble steps, and then, through the hall 
of the palace to the entrance of an immense long- 
salon, at the end of which, seated on a divan, his 
decorations on his breast and his sword at his 
side, was the Mushir. 

No one else was in the room ; and Yosef, who 
had followed me quakingly up the steps^ had 
stopped at the door. As I walked up the room I 
commenced to wonder what I should say. I had 
been for several months in Arab countries, and 
had a small working vocabulary of Arabic, con- 
sisting of the usual salutations, and such phrases 
as " It is warm," " It is good," " It is bad," " Go 
faster," and "How much is it?" but I did not see 
how I was to carry on a very extended or intel- 
ligible conversation with this small equipment. 
But, mustering up my courage, I advanced toward 
the end of the room, and, after making the grand 
Oriental salute by bending my body, and touch- 
ing my hand first to the floor and then to my 
heart, mouth, and forehead, I opened the conver- 
sation with the customary Oriental salutation, 
" Salaam alekum ! " meaning, " Peace be with 
you ! " 

Now, there are two answers to this salutation — 

you can either reverse it and say, " Alekum 

salaam," which seems rather like saying, " You're 

another," or you may place your right hand on 

your breast, and afterward raise it to vour fore- 

230 




The Interview with the Pacha. 



The Pacha's Levee 



head and say, " Kahweh daiman ! " which means, 
" May you never want coffee ! " 

My distinguished host used neither, but bowed 
gravely, and with a wave of his hand motioned 
me to a seat on the divan at his side. Believing 
that a cheerful flow of conversation would relieve 
any embarrassment that he might feel in receiv- 
ing a stranger from a distant part of the world, I 
formulated almost my entire stock in trade of the 
Arabic language into one long, disconnected sen- 
tence, which indicated my anxiety for his welfare, 
touched upon the state of the weather, and con- 
cluded with a variety of shopping phrases and 
donkey-talk, in the course of which I remember 
saying " Bikam deh ? " (What does this cost ?) 
and " U'a riglak " (take care of your foot). 

My host sat calmly through this brilliant and 
pyrotechnic conversational display, but when I 
paused I could discover no sign of comprehension 
upon his grave face. Looking down the room, I 
saw the shrinking form of Yosef just without the 
doors, and, after an abortive attempt to involve 
the Pacha in a French dialogue, I called Yosef's 
name and signalled him to come to my assistance. 

Yosef cringingly and apologetically made his 
way to where I sat, and commenced a series of 
elaborate and conciliatory salaams to the Pacha, 
evidently wishing to convey to that august 
Oriental the fact that he was not personally re- 

2 33 



The Edge of the Orient 



sponsible for my introduction to the palace, and 
had done his best to restrain me." 

" Yosef," I said, " the old gentleman does not 
seem to fully grasp my Arabic ; suppose you try 
him and find out what the trouble is." 

Yosef then addressed himself to the Pacha, who 
replied in Turkish, and Yosef then explained to 
me that his excellency did not understand Arabic, 
having only lately come here from Constantinople. 

My knowledge of the Turkish language was 
limited to the single word git, which conveys the 
same forceful idea in Turkish as in English, and, 
as I was momentarily expecting the Pacha to in- 
troduce this expressive monosyllable in his speech, 
I resolved to throw the burden of the conversa- 
tion upon my dragoman. 

''Yosef," said I, "you shall interpret my Eng- 
lish into the most flowery Turkish of which you 
are capable ; " for experience had taught me that 
a man who has been brought up in the land of the 
Arabian Nights, requires that the conversation 
addressed to him shall be exceedingly ornate 
before he can detect a complimentary flavor in it. 

" Tell his Excellency," I began, " that my eyes 
have feasted upon the garden of the world, this 
earthly paradise, the fair city of Damascus, and that 
I could not take my way back to the New World 
without paying my respects to the ruler of this 
most ancient of cities, whose name and military 
exploits are so well known even in far America." 

234 



The Pacha's Levee 



I did not know his name myself at the time, 
and the sword by his side had suggested the mil- 
itary heroism, but the exigencies of Oriental 
politeness require the straining of a point or two 
when a compliment is to be paid. 

Yosef evidently rendered my remarks in satis- 
factory Turkish, and a pleased smile gradually 
took the place of the puzzled look on the Pacha's 
face. Then it was his turn, and he gave me back 
as good as I sent. " Never had he been so hon- 
ored before. It was true that he had been visited 
by many Europeans, but never before had he had 
the happiness of entertaining a traveller from 
America, that great land beyond the seas." 

Yosef was kept busy bandying compliments, 
until T had exhausted every superlative which my 
ingenuity could apply to Damascus, its people, 
its rulers, and its immediate surroundings, and 
then the Pacha excused himself for a moment and 
left the room. Presently he returned and handed 
me three of his cards, which read as follows : 




<J*e L/ene'ml i/.e dJit'i-.tion 
Loninianda/it ctu 5' i-o-tas a \^Lime'e 



235 



The Edge of the Orient 



Not to be outdone in generosity, I produced 
my card-case, and added three more of my own 
to the one which had disappeared up the steps, 
and which the Pacha now held in his hand. He 
received them with a becoming show of grati- 
tude, and, placing them upon the divan, clapped 
his hands smartly together. 

Two Ethiopians immediately sprang from an 
adjoining room in answer to this signal, and ad- 
vanced bowing to take his orders, which done, 
they retired to another room, almost immediately 
reappearing bearing large trays covered with 
richly embroidered gold cloths, upon which were 
various sweets, fig-paste, Turkish-delight, grape- 
jelly, and golden goblets filled with sweetened 
water flavored with rose. 

These were placed before me, and with a small 
spoon I took a mouthful of the grape-jelly, the 
Pacha did likewise, and then from another tray 
we took tiny cups of thick coffee and delicious 
cigarettes. When I had taken my coffee and 
smoked my cigarette, I arose to take my leave ; 
for conversation, even under Yosef's fostering 
care, had languished, and I did not care for any 
more grape-jelly and rose-water before breakfast ; 
so, expressing my pleasure in having seen the 
distinguished Pacha, I was about to withdraw. 
But the Pacha intended a further honor for me. 

Rising from the divan, he accompanied me to the 

236 




The Pacha's Levee. 



The Pacha's Levee 



end of the room, and then to the head of the 
marble steps. 

During my visit many carriages had arrived, 
and the Church and State dignitaries had been 
side-tracked into another room until my interview 
with the Pacha should terminate. The conspicu- 
ous honor which the Pacha was doing me, in ac- 
companying me to the head of the steps, evidently 
made a great impression upon the waiting crowd, 
and, as I reached the top step, the Pacha raised his 
hand, and the Turkish band burst forth into a 
furious march. The soldiers presented arms, and 
the crowd opened a passageway for me toward 
the carriages. 

With a parting salaam I marched down the 
steps, Yosef behind me, no longer cringing and 
trembling, but with his head in the air and a tri- 
umphant smile upon his face. I had walked over 
from the hotel, but it would never do for me to 
take my departure in so humble a manner while 
the eyes of the Pacha were upon me, so, without 
turning my head, I spoke in English to my proud 
retainer: 

" Yosef, pick out the best-looking carriage, with 
a gold-laced cavass on the box, that you can see, 
and command the coachman to drive up to me at 
once." 

Yosef did as he was bid, a gorgeous equipage 

appeared, and I stepped into it ; and, at a word 

239 



The Edge of the Orient 

from Yosef, we whirled away out of the square. 
When we were well out of sight I stopped the 
carriage, bestowed a liberal backsheesh upon the 
driver and the cavass, and sent them back to 
wait for their master, while Yosef and I walked 
back to the hotel. 

As we walked along, Yosef, whose elation was 
unbounded at having made his first appearance in 
the Mushir's palace, could scarcely contain him- 
self. 

" Excellency," he suggested, " there is 'nother 
levee after breakfast ; you like, we go to the 
palace of the civil governor." 

" No, Yosef," I replied. "'It ees not neces- 
sairy.' I have had enough grape -jelly, rose- 
water, and Turkish-delight for one da)*. After 
breakfast we will go the bazaars." 



240 



XI 

ALEXANDRIA AND CAIRO 

THE traveller who journeys to Egypt by means 
of a P. & O. steamer has a foretaste of the 
Orient on board ship. The crew is mostly com- 
posed of Punjabis, and Lascars from Gogo, near 
Bombay, in blue cotton shirts and white draw- 
ers, whose shanty songs are composed of Mo- 
hammedan creeds, the names of God and the 
Prophets, and as they haul away on the ropes 
they keep up an endless repetition of " Allah ! 
El Mahdi ! Allah! Mohammed!" varied by an 
occasional " Yallah ! Yallah ! " or " faster ! faster ! " 
The firemen and stokers, who from time to time 
come up from the depths of the ship to breathe, 
are also Mohammedans, being mostly Zanzibaris 
and Soudanese, while the rest of the motlev 
ship's company is made up of Portuguese sailors, 
Italian and Swiss stewards, and English officers. 

The forward deck of the steamer is partitioned 
off by a canvas screen, and there, surrounded by a 
curious assortment of domestic animals, cows, 

sheep, and pigs, and crates of pigeons, ducks, and 

241 



The Edge of the Orient 



various barn-yard fowls, these dark-skinned Mo- 
hammedans prepare their unappetizing looking 
messes. 

Egypt rises reluctantly from the sea, and the 
first indication you have of nearing Alexandria is 
when a smart-looking little open boat, with two 
lateen sails, comes shooting out of the southeast 
and brings up alongside to deposit a blue-robed, 
white-turbaned pilot on board. Then, Tommy 
Atkins, who has been pitching rings and playing 
shuffle-board for the past few days in fatigue 
uniform, goes below and presently reappears in 
white cross-straps and pith helmet, with a de- 
spatch-bag slung over his shoulder, and strains 
his eyes to see the gleam of the Egyptian sands, 
and wonders if there are orders in his bag which 
will send him tramping hundreds of miles up into 
the burning desert to fight with " Fuzzy- Wuzzy " 
in the Soudan. 

Presently you distinguish a tall pillar rising 

from the sea, and a light-house, the oldest in the 

world, which stands near the site where the great 

tower of Pharos, one of the seven wonders of the 

world, once reared its head; and then a long row 

of windmills and the flat coast of Egypt come 

into view, and a great harbor filled with the 

masts, funnels, and smoke of its shipping, with 

the long white line of the city behind, accented 

by rounded domes and gleaming minarets. 

242 



Alexandria and Cairo 



First impressions of Alexandria are apt to be a 
trifle confused, for even before you can let your 
eye wander over the full extent of the city your 
steamer is surrounded by small boats, and a blue- 
gowned, red-turbaned, brown-legged swarm of 
humanity tumbles over the side like a devastating 
cloud of army-worms, and seizes your bags, your 
trunks, your canes and umbrellas, and your per- 
son, and endeavors to distribute you and your 
belongings into a dozen different boats. 

If after a display of stern purpose, backed with 
a creditable exhibition of physical force, you 
succeed in getting all of your impedimenta, in 
the way of boxes and bags, safely in one boat, 
you are rowed ashore to the custom-house, where 
you are again pounced upon by an eager mob, 
who distribute your property among them- 
selves in the greatest number of separate pack- 
ages which their ingenuity can devise, and start 
on a run down the long wharf, an imposing array 
of carriers, which somehow reminds you of the 
pictures of Stanley crossing the Dark Continent; 
and you struggle along after, conscious of your 
utter inability to formulate an intelligible protest 
in Arabic, and wondering if you will ever see any 
of your luggage again. 

Alexandria is so much less interesting than 
Cairo that the traveller as a rule spends only 
such time there as is unavoidable before taking 

243 



The Edge of the Orient 



the first train for the Egyptian capital, for the 
sights of the city and all its show places, such as 
Pompey's Pillar and the Catacombs, can be com- 
fortably managed in a few hours' sightseeing. 
The city was rendered much more interesting to 
me from the fact that I knew some Greek- 
Egyptians who lived there, and was thus priv- 
ileged to obtain an idea of Egyptian life in an 
Egyptian city, rarely attainable to the traveller. 

Their house was on one of the larger avenues 
near the Place Mehemet Ali, and was entered by 
a driveway closed by great iron gates. Behind 
the house was a garden, where cool fountains 
plaved, and Greek statues— relics of the splen- 
dor of the ancient cit} T — were embowered in the 
dense green of the tropical foliage. The first 
story of the house was given over to a private 
museum of Greek and Egyptian antiquities, and 
for storage rooms and quarters for the servants. 
The second floor contained the formal drawing- 
room, reception, and music rooms, while the 
dining-room and living rooms of the family were 
up still another flight, an arrangement necessitat- 
ing a considerable climbing of stairs, as eleva- 
tors have not yet been introduced in the private 
houses of Egypt. 

We dined at a table which might have been 

laid in Paris or London or New York, and the 

elaborate dinner bespoke the offices of a French 

244 



Alexandria and Cairo 



chef in the kitchen. After dinner we listened to 
selections from Grieg and Wagner on a Steinway 
piano in the music-room, and even the conscious- 
ness that there were a dozen mummies on the 
first floor could hardly make me realize that I 
was in Egypt. 

A stroll through the streets of the city is inter- 
esting chiefly because of the great number of dif- 
ferent nationalities and varied costumes which 
you see. Most of the principal buildings of the 
town have been erected since the bombardment 
of 1882, and are neither picturesque nor beauti- 
ful. In the Turkish quarter a collection of board 
shanties has been put up in place of the houses 
destroyed by the British shells, giving that part 
of the city the appearance of being a temporary 
show, like the Turkish village at the World's 
Fair, although not as interesting. 

I saw a little incident in the Arab cemetery 
which illustrated the Egyptian etiquette of the 
complete division of the sexes, which does not 
allow of men and women being seen together in 
public, even if they be husband and wife, father 
and daughter, or brother and sister. I was 
seated near a marble headstone richly carved 
with gilded Arabic inscriptions, and surmounted 
by a red fez carved from stone, when a sad little 
procession entered. At its head was a young 
mother holding in her arms the dead body of her 

245 



The Edge of the Orient 



little girl wrapped in an Eastern shawl. Follow- 
ing her were a number of women moaning and 
lamenting, and at some distance behind came the 
father surrounded by a group of men. When the 
mother had reached the appointed place she laid 
the little body tenderly upon the ground, and 
drawing back the shawl kissed and caressed the 
face of her dead child, while the tears streamed 
down her cheeks. Then with the other women 
she withdrew to some little distance and the hus- 
band approached and took the little dead child 
in his arms, moaning and swaying back and forth 
in his grief, while the men gathered about to 
comfort him. 

Then two of the men scraped a little shallow 
trough in the ground and laid the tiny body in 
the shawl at rest. Then all the men withdrew 
and the mother once more approached, and after 
one more despairing look, she was led away quiv- 
ering with grief, the men going one way and the 
women another, leaving the little grave to be 
bricked up and cemented above ground, accord- 
ing to the Arab custom. 

One day we drove with two ladies of the fam- 
ily — or rather after them — to their great private 
garden on the Mahmudiyeh canal, about three 
miles beyond the city. In the midst of a wonder- 
fully beautiful enclosure brilliant with the bloom 

of tropical plants, scarlet poinsettas and great 

246 



Alexandria and Cairo 



vines of purple bougainvillea, was the great 
white stone house which they occasionally use as 
a summer residence, from the flat roof of which 
a view of the whole garden could be obtained, 
with orchards of peaches, apricots, oranges, and 
citrons, and fields of melons and sugar-cane ; and 
beyond, the red roofs of the city outlined against 
the blue Mediterranean. 

On a night in 1882 they were giving a grand 
ball here. The English fleet was lying in the 
harbor of Alexandria, and many of the officers 
had eagerly accepted this opportunity to dance 
with the pretty Greek-Egyptian girls of Alexan- 
dria in the beautiful gardens. 

While the ball was at its height word came 
from the town that Arabi Pacha had risen and 
that the Europeans in the city were being massa- 
cred. Then came messengers from the ships or- 
dering all officers to report immediately on board 
for duty, and before the rumor had reached the 
musicians or the strains of the last waltz had died 
away, they had strapped on their swords, jumped 
on their horses, and were riding for their lives 
toward the harbor. Then came fresh alarms 
from the city; two servants pulled up their pant- 
ing horses with the news that the city house was 
being sacked and that a mob was on its way out 
to attack the gardens. Gardeners and workmen 

about the place came and threw themselves at 

247 



The Edge of the Orient 



the feet of their master, promising to protect him 
and his family with their lives ; the men were 
armed and posted about the great stone walls of 
the garden, and preparations were made to bar- 
ricade the doors and windows of the house, that 
they might sell their lives as dearly as possible. 
Then the whole company flocked to the housetop, 
where they could hear the noise of firing in the 
city and see the flames devour the houses about 
the Place Mehemet Ali. There they could dis- 
tinguish the outline of the city house as it burst 
into flames, telling of the destruction of all their 
treasures of art and antiquity. The suspense be- 
came unbearable ; at any moment they expected 
to hear the yells of the Arab fanatics outside the 
garden walls. Some one told the musicians to 
play another waltz, and although almost dis- 
tracted by fear, they all joined in the dance, glad 
to do anything to relieve the terrible strain ; and 
so the night passed with dancing and praving, 
with laughter and trembling ; first climbing to 
the roof to see the city all ablaze with flames that 
told of sickening massacre, then descending to 
the ball-room in vain efforts to try and forget 
their terror for a moment ; until at last the 
morning came, and with it word that the imme- 
diate danger was over. 

This must have been a thrilling night, this 

dancing with death and murder at the very door, 

248 



Alexandria and Cairo 

and as we sat beneath the orange-trees and heard 
the story we found it difficult to realize that this 
beautiful garden, where timid gazelles with great 
brown eyes browsed about the edge of the foun- 
tain, had so nearly been laid waste and its owners 
had so narrowly escaped being massacred at the 
hands of the Arab fanatics. 

Arabi Pacha's career was short but brilliant. 
A man of the people, he studied at El Azhar and 
imbibed the fanatic spirit of the Moslem college. 
He was the orator of the people, and his bat- 
tle cry was "Egypt for the Egyptians;" but he 
found himself utterly powerless to cope with 
the strength of the great nation which he had 
aroused, and as incapable of carrying on a pro- 
tracted warfare against them as he would have 
been of governing and improving the condition 
of the Egyptian people had his dream of conquest 
been realized. 

From Alexandria to Cairo is a little over four 
hours' ride in a modern English railway carriage 
over a good road-bed ; to this time should be 
added, however, an extra hour for the inevitable 
skirmish with porters, baggage-weighers, and 
ticket-sellers at the station, before you are fair- 
ly on board with the door of your compartment 
closed. 

Traversing the border of Lake Mareotis you 

travel for miles through the low marshes of the 

249 



The Edge of the Orient 



delta, rich with a lusty growth of green, but 
monotonous and uninteresting save for the long 
strings of laden camels and donkeys which trav- 
erse the narrow paths on the embankments of 
the innumerable canals and water-ways. 

From time to time you pass little collections 
of mud huts, so small and insignificant as to be 
scarcely distinguishable under the clumps of 
palm-trees that shelter them. 

A little more than half way to Cairo you obtain 
a first view of the Nile as the train crosses the 
Rosetta arm at Kafr ez-Zaiyat by a long iron 
bridge, under which the father of rivers rolls 
muddy, sullen, and brown, in open defiance of 
the milliners and dressmakers, who have chosen a 
light pale green as his proper garb and have given 
it his name. An hour's ride farther on the train 
stops for a few minutes at Tanta, which lies be- 
tween the Rosetta and Damietta branches of the 
Nile. Tanta is famous for its bazaars and fairs, 
but its principal product, to judge from the dis- 
play at the railway station, consists of boiled eggs. 
As soon as the train slows up at the station baskets 
of them appear at the door of every compartment, 
and are pushed through the windows by the 
brown-skinned venders. They are infinitesimal 
in size and are sold at various prices, dropping to 
almost nothing a moment before the train leaves. 
The acute intelligence of these ragged merchants 



250 




A Cairo Street. 



Alexandria and Cairo 



is attested by their universal appreciation of 
boiled eggs as the most salable article of food, 
as the newly arrived traveller in Egypt could 
hardly be persuaded to buy anything from such 
a ragged, dirty, motley crew, unless it were pro- 
tected from dirt and possible disease by an invul- 
nerable shell. After a few weeks in Arab coun- 
tries you eat almost anything, and are glad to get 
it, but this hardened appetite comes gradually 
as the cultivated prejudices of civilization wear 
away. 

Arrived in Cairo you go to Shepheard's Hotel. 
It is true that there are other hotels where some 
people choose to go, as some New York men 
choose to live in Brooklyn or Hoboken ; but 
Shepheard's is Cairo, and any departure from it 
places you out of touch of the life of the city. All 
the news is either made there or brought there, 
and the bulletins of races and sham battles, of ten- 
nis matches and private theatricals, and all the 
divertisements and advertisements of the Eng- 
lish army of occupation are first posted in its hall- 
ways. 

There the lieutenant on short pay betakes 
himself in his oft-turned scarlet mess-jacket to 
adorn the table and s:ive local color to the dinners 
of the latest arrivals. There the officer returning 
to England advertises that he will exchange his 
polo pony for a silver-mounted travelling case. 

253 



The Edge of the Orient 



There the brown-eyed dragomen gather at the 
door in robes of silks, swinging their little canes 
and beguiling travellers with stories of the won- 
derful sights they can guide them to, as if there 
was anything in the world better worth seeing 
than the shifting panorama of the street in front 
of the hotel piazza. Camels almost hidden under 
great bales of green lodder plod by like animated 
hay-stacks ; clean-shaven donkeys with gay trap- 
pings scamper along, encouraged from behind by 
the shrill cries and sharp proddings of the blue- 
gowned donkey boys ; water-carriers with great 
goat-skins bulging with w r ater from the Nile clink 
their brass cups together ; closed carriages filled 
with white-veiled women whirl by preceded by 
gorgeously dressed runners ; English officers in 
scarlet coats ride by on Arab horses, and between 
the iron bars of the grill which divides the hotel 
yard from the street peer the brown faces of beg- 
gars, idlers, guides, and sidewalk merchants, sur- 
mounted by multi-colored turbans and red fezzes, 
while above the noise of the busy street rises the 
incessant murmur of " bakshish — bakshish!" a 
sound whose constant reiteration you will never 
escape while you are in Arab countries. 

When you have done the mosques and tombs 
and shouting dervishes and other stock sights 
of Cairo you w r ill drift inevitably back to the 
Muski and the bazaars. The chief distinction 

254 



Alexandria and Cairo 



of the Muski is that it is a straight street leading 
in a definite direction, and from it it is possible 
to find your way back to your hotel. Into the 
Muski empty the disordered streets, narrow lanes, 




In the Muski. 



tortuous alleys, and winding by-paths of the 
bazaars, and in the bazaars you may wander for 
hours not knowing where you are, except that 
you are in the very heart of Eastern life and 
color, and need no other diversion than that pro- 
vided by the kaleidoscopic colors of the gay 



255 



The Edge of the Orient 



bazaar and the picturesque crowds that throng 
them. 

Here are Copts in blue turbans, Jews in yellow, 
Sherifs, or descendants of the prophets, and 
Hadjis who have performed their pilgrimage to 
Mecca, in green; and in the stalls grave-faced 
merchants selling bright red and yellow morocco 
shoes, weighing out gold and silver ornaments in 
little scales, spreading wonderfully woven silk- 
rugs before their customers, or beating curious 
oriental designs into great brass trays. You can 
revel in this wealth of color and watch these 
Eastern artisans at their vocations for days to- 
gether and never weary of it, so different is it 
all from our Western standard of life and civil- 
ization. 

There is a mystery about Eastern life that 
fascinates you. You feel that you have never 
penetrated for an instant the inscrutable exterior 
or divined the lightest thought of the grave mer- 
chant who sells you a silver ring. There is a 
mystery about the veiled women w T ho come to 
bargain in the bazaars for days together for some 
ornament on which they have set their hearts. 
There is a mystery about the narrow streets over- 
hung Avith carved latticed balconies, from behind 
which brown eyes are staring at you. There is a 
mystery about their religion and the curious de- 
votions of the fanatics, and the mystery of the 

256 



Alexandria and Cairo 



Sphinx pales before the mystery of a people living 
their lives as they lived them thousands of years 
ago, uninfluenced and untouched by the great 
stream of modern civilization and progress that 
flows around them. 

The camel, the Sphinx, and the Pyramids are 
the great distinguishing signs of Egypt, and it is 
the chief care of every traveller there to get them 
all in conjunction, place himself carefully in focus, 
and be photographed, as it were, " in their midst." 

Travellers, as a rule, confess to some dis- 
appointment when they are brought face to 
face with the Sphinx. It serves fairly well as a 
photographic background, and the New York 
baseball nine have posed in uniform, with bats in 
their hands, between its ample paws and obtained 
satisfactory portraits. Napoleon stood before it 
with folded arms, and had his picture painted so, 
but in spite of such precedents to enhance its 
pictorial possibilities, the expression of the aver- 
age traveller betrays a shadow of disappointment 
as he stands in silent contemplation before the 
huge stone face. 

This feeling may possibly be explained by the 

fact that there are no facilities for climbing to the 

top of the great image and standing on its head. 

The habitual tourist is an educated climber. 

Guide-books, guides, couriers, and dragomen all 

encourage him in the practice of getting to the 

257 



The Edge of the Orient 

top of things, until it becomes a fixed habit. Al- 
though personally averse to the practice I have 




The Sphinx as a Background. 



in weak moments succumbed to the persuasive 
eloquence of others, and, beginning modestly with 

Trinity Church steeple, 1 have climbed laborious- 

258 



Alexandria and Cairo 



ly to the top of most of the large things in the 
world ; I have been beguiled up the endless 
stairways of the Washington monument and ar- 
rived breathless at the top ; I have stood within 
the torch of the Statue of Liberty ; I have gazed 
at Paris from the top of the Arc de Triomphe ; I 
have toiled up the interminable interior of the 
Campanile at Venice ; I have been guided up the 
dark steep steps of the loftiest minaret of the 
great mosque at Damascus ; I have left pleasant 
weather beneath me to stand in snow and fog on 
the Rigi and Pilatus ; I have dragged my weary 
feet to the tops of the Seraskerat and the Galata 
Tower in Constantinople ; I have achieved the 
dome of St. Paul's and the London Monument 
on Fish Street Hill ; I have surmounted the 
Eiffel Tower ; I have stood on the fiery cone of 
Vesuvius and the snow-covered peaks of the 
Lebanons ; I have clambered into the huge ear of 
a half prostrate Rameses; I have been pushed, 
pulled, and persuaded up the great pyramid, and 
have sat in the lap of the Vocal Memnon, in fact 
I have found my way to the top of many of the 
largest objects in the world which are considered 
worth climbing, and although I devoted consider- 
able time to the Sphinx and kodaked it devout- 
ly from different points of view I experienced a 
shade of the same feeling of disappointment until 
I realized that it sprung from the fact that I had 

259 



The Edge of the Orient 



not climbed to the top of it, and consequently 
could not feel that I had done it properly without 
having stood upon its highest point. 

If the Sphinx is expected to rival the great 
pyramids as a star attraction for tourists, or re- 
tain the favor of the conscientious traveller, some 
method must be adopted by means of which one 
could, after great effort, reach the top and stand 
on it, as can be done with all well-regulated 
sights the world over. A tunnel in the sand, 
leading down to the commencement of a dark 
and tortuous winding staircase in the interior 
would be attractive, and why it has not been 
done before I cannot imagine. Herein, to my 
mind, lies one of the mysteries of the Sphinx. 

There is some controversy as to which is the 
most difficult of ascent, the pyramid or the camel. 
Those who have tried both are 
rather disposed to give the latter 
the preference, as he is full of 
unexpected surprises and 
difficulties, and the 
entire uncer- 
tainty as to 
his sub- i 
sequent 
move- 
ments after he has unfolded a dozen or more 

joints beneath you and pitched you in as many 

260 




Alexandria and Cairo 



directions in the air, is remarkably perplex- 



ing. 



How the misleading phrase of " the patient 
camel " arose I cannot conceive, as the so-called 
ship of the desert is the most peevish, irritable, 
bad-tempered, and generally disagreeable brute 
in creation. When you approach him as he 
kneels upon the sand he turns a spiteful and 
calculating eye upon you, as though he were 
reflecting as to just how disagreeable he would 
be able to make himself to a person of your size 
and general make-up. When you clamber into 
the uncomfortable saddle on his back he mutters 
with suppressed rage. If, after he has risen, you 
are still on his back he moans in his wrath and 
twists viciously around to bite your feet. His 
walk is annoying, his trot is torture, and his gal- 
lop is anguish, and before you have been on him 
five minutes you know that " the patient camel " 
must once have read " the patient camel rider," 
and that the last word has been shaken off some- 
where in the desert. 

The donkey, on the other hand, is a pleasant 

disappointment, he is strong, docile, willing, and 

sometimes fast, and contributes not a little to your 

enjoyment of the Nile trip, when you spend whole 

days upon his back. He is generally named 

Rameses the Great, but answers as readily to any 

other name, such as Hail Columbia, Mr. Glad- 

261 



The Edge of the Orient 



stone, Loie Fuller, Yvette Guilbert, or Kaiser 
Wilhelm, that the donkey-boy may diplomatically 
christen him with for the day. 

He is as tireless as the bronzed figures along the 
Nile that toil ceaselessly from morning to night 
at the shadoofs, the rude and entirely inadequate 




Rameses the Great, an Egyptian Donkey. 

appliances for irrigation, which for hundreds of 
miles stretch along on either bank of the river, so 
that you are never out of hearing of their con- 
stant creak, as the weary backs of the fellaheen 
bend from sunrise to sunset over the hard, monot- 
onous task of sending a tiny little stream of 

water trickling through the dry, parching fields, 

262 



Alexandria and Cairo 



on the product of which their very lives de- 
pend. 

Your donkey will take you on many pleasant 
excursions on the Nile trip, and from the moment 




Two Little Fellaheen Girls. 



you leave your dahabiyeh until you return you 
scarcely leave his back. He will stand for hours 
in the bazaars, while you sit on his back and bar- 
gain for silk head - shawls or curious weapons. 

265 



The Edge of the Orient 



He will push his way through the most crowded 
alleys. He will wait patiently and uncomplain- 
ingly while you purchase a koorbash to acceler- 
ate his speed, and your day ended he will scam- 
per through the narrow lanes and mud huts to 
the outskirts of the village, and back to the river 
where your boat awaits you, pausing tentatively 
on the way when the pretty little brown-eyed 
children, with voices like birds, call to the How- 
adji for bakshish ; and when you have dismount- 
ed he goes off at a hand gallop with the don- 
key boy on his back, both joyous in the pros- 
pect of an immediate repast after their day's 
work. 



266 




A Nile Landing. 



XII 
LUXOR AND ASSOUAN 

FOUR hundred and fifty miles above Cairo, 
on the east bank of the Nile, lies Luxor, 
a small town with a few thousand inhabitants, 
which owes its importance to the fact that it is 
situated close to the ruins of the great temples 
of ancient Thebes, that magnificent and stately 
city of old, with its one hundred gates and twenty 
thousand chariots of war. 

As our dahabiyeh drew up to the landing- 
place of this town one afternoon in the early 
spring, we were greeted with the usual babel of 
sound attendant on all Nile landings — donkey- 
boys, dragomans, and venders of spurious an- 
tiques vying with each other to attract the atten- 
tion of the traveller, and, if possible, to divert his 
bakshish. 

Among those who boarded the dahabiyeh as 
soon as the gang-plank was laid to the shore was 
a man in a gay-striped kuftan and red tarboosh, 
who distributed little slips of freshly printed pa- 
per among the passengers, which read as follows : 

269 



The Edge of the Orient 



NOTICE. 

Arabic Circus. 

At g P.M. Every Night. 

In consequence of the second performance which will be this 
evening at nine o'clock p.m., We beg you kindly to give us a 
call and you will be pleased of our play which is introducing of 
maney novels and surprising scenes, consisting of amusing 
Horses and Camels, etc., change daily. 

In the Bazar. 

Admission, Two Shillings. 

To one unaccustomed to Eastern scenes all out- 
of-door Egypt seems such a mammoth circus, 
with camels, dromedaries, Arabian horses, don- 
keys, buffaloes, jackals, hyenas, and ever}' thing- 
complete, that I was anxious to see what the 
" maney novels and surprising scenes " would be ; 
so after dinner I hailed a liammar, as the donkey- 
boys are called, and mounting a big white don- 
key, rode through the narrow, hot, and dusty 
streets toward the other side of the town to the 
place of the gemel bazar. 

It was the market-day, and the streets were filled 
with merchants who had sold their stuffs and em- 
broidered cloths, spices, dates, sugar-cane, camels, 
donkeys, buffaloes, and sheep, and were investing 
some of their profits in the merchandise of the 
town or making their way toward the tent where 

the circus was to take place, the direction of 

270 



Luxor and Assouan 



i< 



which was indicated by a sound of monotonous 
piping, and beating on small drums. Mahmoud, 
my donkey-boy, ran along by my side, keeping 
up a cheerful flow 
of conversation in 
broken English, and 
expatiating upon the 
merits of his donkey, 
which, like all other 
donkeys which had 
been recommended 
to me, was the best 
in all Egypt, no other 
being so fast, so will- 
ing, so sure-footed, 
so intelligent and so 
beautiful withal. The 
donkey, in the mean- 
time, doubtless real- 
izing the utter impos- 
sibility of ever being 
all that his master 
claimed for him, was 
far from living up to 
the wonderful character so generously bestowed 
on him by his enthusiastic proprietor, being slow 
and stubborn, and stumbling over every loose 
stone in the road. Mahmoud's cries of " Yallah 

aigre ! " (go on faster), accompanied by a liberal 

271 




Mahmoud. 



The Edge of the Orient 



application of the koorbash, would not provoke 
him to speed, nor would the frequent invocations 
of " U'a riglak ! " (take care of your foot) prevent 
him from stumbling. 

As it was early for the circus, which Mahmoud 
informed me commenced " among eight and 
nine," I accepted an invitation to stop for a mo- 
ment at his house and take a cup of black coffee, 
which his wife would prepare ; so my donkey was 
presently halted in front 6f a low stucco building, 
and I dismounted and was ushered into a dark, 
bare, whitewashed room, with a small divan at 
the side and a bright-colored rug partly hiding 
the dirt floor. After throwing open the shutters 
of the small unglazed windows, set high in the 
wall, Mahmoud disappeared, in order to prepare 
his family and render them presentable as far as 
possible. In a few minutes he reappeared with 
his small brother, Moustapha, a little brown mid- 
get about five years old, who was already learn- 
ing to write, and had brought his slate with him 
in order to exhibit his accomplishments. The slate 
consisted of a rough sheet of ordinary roofing- 
tin, upon which the little scholar, sitting cross- 
legged on the floor, scrawled some Arabic char- 
acters with a pointed stick, which he dipped from 
time to time in a little pot of thick black ink. After 
Moustapha had given this proof of his erudition 

and skill, and had been rewarded with enough 

272 



Luxor and Assouan 



piastres to keep him in sugar-cane for a month, 
the little wife appeared ; she was a tiny thing, not 
more than thirteen years old, with a frightened 
look in her dark eyes. Young as she was, this 
little child-wife, in the European gown which 
Mahmoud had brought her from Cairo, had a 
baby of her own, which was presently brought in 
for my inspection, and Amineh, for that was the 
little mother's name, seemed for all the world like 
a little girl with a new doll. 

Through a crack in the half-closed door lead- 
ing into a small court-yard at the rear I could 
discern other members of the family, who were 
evidently unprovided with company manners, 
and so could not make their appearance in the 
reception-room. Mahmoud pointed out to me 
his widowed mother, saying, " He my mudder; 
every day he cry. He no marry again. He 
think it much shame for him if he forget my 
father." 

After a little cup of black coffee, thick with 
grounds, we bade Amineh good-night, and pro- 
ceeded to the tent where the circus was to be 
given. As we approached the place we passed a 
group of guileless-looking Bicharines from the 
Soudan, who had come down with camels for 
sale, and were now endeavoring to add to their 
gains by singing to the accompaniment of rude 
stringed instruments, and soliciting bakshish. 

273 



The Edge of the Orient 



Two crreat torches flared at the entrance to the 
circus tent, and Mahmoud and 1 placed ourselves 
at the end of a line of blue-gowned, turbaned 
Egyptians, and filed in and took seats at the side 
of the rinsr, where we could obtain an uninter- 
rupted view of the whole performance. Ali 
Moorad Effendi, the United States consular agent 
at Luxor, sat beside me and endeavored to eluci- 
date the meaning of the performance for my ben- 
efit. Numerous oil -lamps suspended about the 
tent shed a rather feeble light over the rows of 
cheap seats at the farther side of the tent, where 
the greater part of the audience, in blue or 
brown gowns, red tarbooshes, and green and 
white turbans, were crowded together on the nar- 
row boards. A little bright-faced bit of a girl 
about four years old was playing on the ground 
at the entrance of the dressing-tent, and my 
friend, Ali Moorad, who is a liberal and regular 
patron of art, and makes a point of attending 
the circus every night during the brief season, 
called my attention to the little tot, saying: 

" He smart girl ; he make small dances; he know 
all 'bout it." 

Then there was a flourish of trumpets, and a 
small Egyptian boy came out, clad in tights and 
spangles, and walked and danced on the tight- 
rope, while a native clown clumsily endeavored 

to amuse the audience by going through the 

274 



Luxor and Assouan 



same motions on the ground. Then came the 
snake charmers and jugglers, who handled 



Va 



m W- ■ ■ % la 




Snake Charmers and Jugglers. 



hooded cobras and charmed them into obedience 
by weird notes on a long pipe. A trained horse 



275 



The Edge of the Orient 



found a handkerchief which had been hidden in a 
box, and restored it to its owner. A Japanese 
juggler did some clever tricks, and then four 
black men from the Soudan appeared, and while 
two of them twanged away on curious harps of 
rude construction the other pair went through 
a queer pantomimic dance; they wore curious 
black frowsy wigs, and had girdles about their 
waists covered with shells and highly colored 
beads. A weird and unmusical Europeanized 
Egyptian band struggled with the " Marche Bou- 
langer" during the intermission, and the audi- 
ence, which consisted almost entirely of Egyp- 
tian men — only two tourists being present in the 
rude stranger's box at the side — lighted cigarettes 
and waited patiently for the second part. This 
consisted of a play acted by the two clowns. As 
Ali Moorad explained it to me it was very amus- 
ing, and the audience, to judge by their frequent 
laughter, were highly delighted with its humor. 
One of the clowns produced an old table-cloth, 
which he tried to sell to the other, as he had 
" finish money," and wished to get more that he 
might go to the bazaar and buy food. The pros- 
pective purchaser pointed out the holes and de- 
fects in the cloth, whereupon the first declared 
that it was all the more valuable for that reason, 
as it was an "antika." 

This provoked the laughter of the many vener- 

276 



Luxor and Assouan 



able gray-beards in the audience who liveth by 
selling " genuine antiques,'* which are manufact- 
ured by the ton in Luxor, to the guileless and 
unsuspecting traveller. Failing to convince his 
friend of the value of the table-cloth, the clown 
proposed another scheme by which money might 
be raised. Clown number one suggested that 
clown number two should stretch himself on the 
ground as though dead ; this done, number one 
covered the body with the table-cloth, and com- 
menced the wildest lamentations, which soon at- 
tracted the attention of a kind-hearted passer-by. 
The clown managed between the throes of his 
grief to explain to the stranger that his brother 
had just died, and that he was disconsolate, as he 
had not the money to provide a proper burial 
or a headstone for the grave. The kind-hearted 
traveller sympathized with him in his sorrow, 
and handed him a purse of gold. At this the 
mourner burst out in a fresh storm of weeping, 
wailing, and lamentations, which he kept up till 
the traveller was out of sight, when he turned 
handsprings of delight at the success of his ruse. 
Meanwhile the other clown had risen, and re- 
quested a division of the spoil, which was ob- 
jected to by the first, who offered, however, to 
change places with him, and to try the same ruse 
a second time. This was done, and a second 

charitable stranger was about to hand a purse to 

2 79 



The Edge of the Orient 



the sorrowing brother, when the cupidity of the 
corpse was aroused to such an extent that he rose 
from his winding-sheet, seized the money, and 
was out of sight in an instant, to the dismay of 
his accomplice, the bewilderment of the benevo- 
lent wayfarer, and the intense amusement of the 
Moslem audience. 

This ended the programme, and I mounted my 
white donkey, and we rode back toward the Nile 
in the bright moonlight, which was so brilliant 
that you could distinguish color by it, the 
oranges shining like globes of gold among the 
green leaves of the trees as we passed the gar- 
dens sweet with the smell of roses in the cool 
night -air. The silence was unbroken save by 
the occasional faint report of a gun, which 
marked the death of some prowling jackal in 
the desert beyond the town. 

On reaching the dahabiyeh Mahmoud made a 
parting salaam, and springing on the white don- 
key, gave a shrill cry, which echoed along the 
silent river, and then disappeared up the road in 
a little cloud of yellow dust, which hung like a 
vapor in the moonlight, while I stepped over the 
sleeping Egyptian sailors who were coiled up on 
the deck, and found my way to my bunk, to 
dream of Egypt until the hot sun rose high again 
over the yellow sand-hills. 

Luxor is the centre of interest for the traveller 

280 



Luxor and Assouan 



in Upper Egypt, as all the wonders of ancient 
Thebes lie scattered on the plains and in the 
mountains about it. From Luxor you are ferried 
across the river in small boats with your donkeys, 
to cross the green plain overshadowed by the 
great Colossi of Memnon, and to take the long, 




Valley of the Tombs of the Kings. 

hot ride in the burning sun through scorching 
sands and desolate barren rocks to the valley of 
the Tombs of the Kings. All day long, through 
the insufferable heat, a little brown slip of a boy 
seven or eight years old will run by your side as 
your patient donkey jogs along, and hand you 
from time to time the porous stone bottle or 



The Edge of the Orient 



kollcJi, with its mouth stopped by an orange, 
which he carries on his head. You may at first 
refuse it, thinking that water carried about in the 
hot sun so long would be a mawkish drink, but 
when you finally yield to his entreaties you find 
it cool and refreshing as ice-water, owing to the 
rapid evaporation from the porous clay in the 
fierce sunlight. 

Returning from the Tombs of the Kings you 
come to Dayr-el-Bahree, that most wonderful 
find of Ahmed the Tomb Robber, from which, in 
July, 1881, Brugsch Bey led that majestic proces- 
sion of thirty-six of the greatest kings, queens, 
princes, and princesses of ancient Egypt, among 
whom were Seti the First, Rameses the Great, 
and the three Tutmes, who, after over three thou- 
sand years of retirement, were once more to play 
an important part in Egyptian life by being 
placed on exhibition in the museum at Gizeh to at- 
tract tourists, a strange commentary on the futility 
of their herculean efforts in building huge tombs 
and sinking mammoth shafts into the very heart 
of the mountains, in order that they might lie at 
peace and undisturbed until the judgment day, but, 
on the other hand, a strong argument for the pro- 
longed usefulness of mummied kings to a nation. 

When this solemn procession of the great rulers 

of their ancient land floated down the river to 

Cairo, it was attended for miles on either bank 

282 



Luxor and Assouan 



by thousands of the fellaheen, the women with 
their hair loosened, filling the air with their 
lamentations and throwing dust over their heads, 
and the men firing guns as at a funeral ; a curious 
demonstration from the oppressed and down- 
trodden race, which once, under the leadership 
of these poor withered bodies which were now 
floating down the river before their very eyes, 
had formed the greatest and most powerful na- 
tion in the world. 

I know of nothing more impressive in the 
whole realm of sight-seeing than to ride from 
Luxor to Karnak on a moonlight night and stand 
among the gigantic columns of the great temple. 
As your donkey gallops along through the streets 
of the town the silence is unbroken save by the 
snarling and barking of the Arab dogs, the ever 
watchful guardians of each little low mud hovel. 
Leaving the houses of the town you follow a long 
road on the top of an embankment which stretches 
across the low ground ; and farther on, under a 
group of palms, you come upon the low tents 
of some of the desert people who have encamped 
for the night, and finally you stand in a great 
forest of gigantic columns, so huge that their 
proportions awe you into silence. At the foot of 
the columns, and in the heavy shadows, crouch 
the dark figures of Arab guides and beggars 

bundled up in their robes, and only revealed by 

283 



The Edge of the Orient 



the gleam of the moonlight on their long gun- 
barrels. On the morrow they will pester your 
every step with supplications for bakshish, but 
now they are taking their night's rest in the 
corridors of this great out-of-door hotel and do 
not intend to be disturbed, and so you may pass 
unmolested among the majestic ruins and great 
columns whose capitals are turned to silver by 
the brilliant moonlight of Egypt, which comes 
from a sky so clear that the very stars seem to 
have left their places to come down to hang like 
gigantic lanterns in the air above your head. 

Above Luxor, the most interesting place on the 
river is Assouan. It is nearly six hundred miles 
above Cairo, and is the virtual terminus of navi- 
gation for the Lower Nile, as large boats cannot 
make their way past the first cataract, and small 
boats are only hauled up along the edge of the 
river by a most laborious process which involves 
hiring a whole tribe of men with a chief, or cata- 
ract reis, at their head, to pull and haul, and even 
then there must be a liberal distribution of bak- 
shish before it can be accomplished. Assouan has 
many points of interest. Here is the beautiful 
island of Philae with its magnificent temples, and 
the ancient Elephantine with its Nilometer. Here 
come caravans from the desert, from the Soudan 
and Abyssinia, bringing ivory and ostrich feathers, 

weapons, amulets, dates and tamarinds, beautiful- 

284 




t 






-. 





j 




Luxor and Assouan 



ly woven and colored basket work, small monkeys 
and captive hyenas ; while the bazaars are filled 
with curiously wrought anklets, ivory rings, silver 
ornaments, and whips of hippopotamus hide. 

Outside the town is one of the largest outposts 
of the Egyptian army, and here in a huge burning 
sand-plain the English officers drill the awkward 
fellaheen recruits until they make good soldiers 
of them, who shall one day, under the leadership 
of the English, reconquer the Soudan and rein- 
vest Khartoum. Wadi Haifa is only an arbitrary 
line drawn across the desert, from which it is 
difficult to protect the attenuated strip of habita- 
ble land which stretches for two hundred miles 
between it and Assouan, but above is a wide 
expanse of green and fruitful country, watered 
by the many branches of the Nile, which is much 
easier to defend and much better worth defend- 
ing, and it is only a question of time when Eng- 
land will assert her power here, and once more 
control the headwaters of the Nile, for to control 
these is to control the very life and existence of 
all Egypt. 

The first cataract at Assouan is a most disap- 
pointing spectacle as a cataract, and were it not 
for the men and boys who make diversion for the 
tourists by shooting and swimming it, it would 
hardly be worth a visit. In a lonely waste of 

rough, barren country, without a habitation in 

287 



The Edge of the Orient 



sight, the river is forced into a narrow gorge 
between great rocks, rounded and polished by 
ages of the river's flow. Here at your approach 
spring, apparently from the ground, dozens of 
lithe-limbed, dark-skinned Nubian divers, ready, 
for the hope of a few piastres, to hurl themselves 
from the rocks into the torrent beneath, or to 
shoot the rapids on big logs of palm wood, on 
which they balance themselves as they paddle 
about in the still water above the falls, waiting 
for the promise of bakshish before embarking 
on their swift passage. Dozens of little brown 
bodies plunge into the waters, with a chug like 
frogs from a bank, and clamber out below, and 
come up naked, dripping, and smiling for piastres, 
which they stow away in their cheeks ; and there 
is something so fine and so fearless about the 
bright eyes and shining faces of these sturdy 
little river gods with their sleek, shining, bronzed 
bodies, that they often come to your mind long 
after you have left Egypt and the Nile behind and 
returned to a civilization of top hats and patent- 
leather boots, of stiff collars and frock coats, of 
manners, customs, and amusements so much less 
free and wholesome and refreshing that you some- 
times wish that you could be, if only for an hour, 
an unencumbered little brown Nubian with the 
sun shining on your body, and the splashing 

waters of the Nile rolling at your feet. 

288 



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